Former Sun editor MacKenzie saw the sports-based station TalkSPORT achieve a weekly reach of 2.4m in the latest round of Rajar results, up 1% on last year's 2.1m. Its share of listeners, however, was down to 1.3% from 1.6%.
The BBC's lead over the commercial sector rose to a 53.4% share of the UK radio audience, an increase of 1.7% on the same period last year, as commercial radio saw its share fall 1.4% to 44.6%.
The BBC's star performer was BBC Radio 2, which saw its weekly reach rise from 10.7m to 12.3m while its audience share increased to 15.2% from 13.6% last time.
Despite the fall in the commercial audience, shares in the UK's main commercial radio owners rose on the strength of the latest Rajar results.
While the results, for the last quarter of 2001, showed a general increase in weekly reach among the main national stations, all stations showed a fall in the share of the radio audience.
Shares in SMG, owner of Virgin Radio, climbed 1.7% to 119.5p this morning despite a decline in the station's total weekly reach to 3.2m from 3.4m last time. Virgin's audience share fell to 1.8% from 2.2%.
GWR rose 2.98% to 224p on the news that its national classical radio station Classic FM increased its weekly reach to 6.7m from 6m, with an audience share of 4.5%, down from 4.7% last time. Its public service rival, BBC Radio 3, retained its weekly reach of 1.98m with an audience share of 1.1%, against last year's 1.2%.
Capital Radio Group, owner of Capital 95.8fm and Xfm, saw its shares rise 2.28% to 672.5p on good performances from its stations. Capital's total weekly reach grew to 29% from 28% last time.
Capital 95.8fm's weekly reach also climbed 1% to 8.1m, while its audience share fell to 10.9% from 12.4%. Capital's alternative music station Xfm's weekly reach increased to 450,000 from 423,000. Its audience share fell to 1.3% from 1.4%.
Dance music station Kiss FM claims to have scored highly with its weekly reach rising 2% year on year to 1.6m, sending Emap's shares 0.28% higher to 707p, and Kiss retained its 4.2% share of the radio audience.
Jazz FM, which was recently posted its first ever profit and launched a £20m bid for London News Radio, saw its weekly reach fall 1% to 857,000, and its audience share fall 0.6% to 1%.
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