KEY POINTS:
The honeymoon period is over for Mark Sainsbury as Close Up's rating figures appear to be following the slump of One News.
The TV One weeknight current affairs show still dominates overall, bringing in more than twice as many viewers aged 5+ nationally as its rival, Campbell Live
on TV3.
But its audience share was down last month in almost every key ratings category, compared with June last year.
And it seemed host Sainsbury was losing his viewers to rival John Campbell, with TV3's 7pm current affairs show catching up.
Campbell Live's ratings were up or steady in audience share in all categories in June, compared with a year earlier.
It drew level with Close Up among Aucklanders aged 18 to 49 - each having 20 per cent of the audience share for the 7pm timeslot.
A year ago, Close Up was four percentage points clear of its rival, according to the AGB Nielsen Media Research figures.
TV3 was also winning the battle for 6pm news viewers. It has increased its audience share in every category at the expense of One News during the year.
New Zealand Broadcasting School head Paul Norris said the trend was unmistakable in both the nightly news and current affairs slots.
"It is a relentless trend against TV One and in favour of TV3," said the former TVNZ news and current affairs boss.
"It is astonishing that the trend is there in all those statistics."
Mr Norris said negative publicity over the state broadcaster's cutbacks and restructuring harmed its standing.
He said it was too soon to see any change in fortune from the arrival of new TVNZ news boss Anthony Flannery from Australia in May.
"He is, of course, the one with the headache in that he's got to try to formulate the strategies to try and reverse that trend.
"Once a trend gets set in, for whatever reason, it is hard to turn around."
Martin Gillman, chief executive of media planner and buyer Total Media, said TVNZ's newsroom needed stability.
"There was lots of controversy and obviously there's been a lot of internal strife."
TVNZ news publicist Rachel Lorimer said it was too simplistic to compare June last year with June this year.
But she said both Close Up and Campbell Live performed consistently over the time, with just small fluctuations month by month.
The draw of the plotline on TV2 soap opera Shortland Street contributed to the movements.
"We are delighted with the performance of Close Up," said Ms Lorimer.
While One News steadily gained audience share in the channel's target 25-to-54 market over five months to a 38 per cent share last month, it was still behind its 41 per cent take of June last year.
"We're getting good feedback that the news is more relevant and more indepth," she said.
TV3 director of communications Roger Beaumont said Campbell Live had proved itself and was strong in the five metropolitan markets. He credited the figures to a stronger current affairs show with the "right mix" of stories, helped by 3News' performance.
