Calls have mounted for ABC’s low-rating program Q&A to be scrapped for good as the show is slammed as ‘one-sided, uninteresting and rarely funny’. 

Political commentator Peter Van Onselen said the program would not be missed if it didn’t return to ABC’s roster in 2024. 

In an opinion piece for The Australian, Van Onselen said Q&A – currently hosted by Patricia Karvelas – had received 203,000 views nationally on Monday night. 

The program received 59,000 viewers in Sydney, 81,000 in Melbourne, 25,000 in Brisbane, 25,000 in Adelaide and just 19,000 in Perth.

Media Watch aired immediately before Q&A and was watched by 374,000 people, while Channel Nine’s afternoon news bulletin had 240,000 viewers. 

Van Onselen said it was time for Q&A to be ‘scrapped altogether’.  

Political commentator Peter Van Onselen said the program would not be missed on Australian screens if it didn’t return to ABC’s roster in 2024

‘With numbers this woeful coupled with how out of touch with mainstream Australia the program has become, it really needs to be put out of its misery,’ he wrote. 

‘There have been enough failed reboots to justify finally axing it.’

The commentator said cracks started to appear after Tony Jones stopped hosting after a decade in the role from 2008 to 2019. 

‘It wasn’t all that long ago that the program was vibrant and interesting, with discussions well led by former host Tony Jones,’ Van Onselen wrote. 

‘I remember appearing on it at the time. Ratings regularly hit the one million mark, which precipitated the discussion about changing its time slot.’

Van Onselen lashed the show for not being informative enough and hosting discussions that were ‘one-sided, uninteresting and rarely funny’. 

He claimed it was the ABC’s ‘stubbornness’ that was saving the show from being axed for good but that a replacement would be welcomed.

Hamish MacDonald replaced Jones as a host in 2020 but resigned in July 2021 after overwhelming personal abuse and trolling on social media. 

In May 2021, Q&A returned to its original timeslot of Thursday at 8.30pm and saw views plummet from 600,000 to 200,000 in five major capital cities that April. 

David Speers hosted Q&A from 2021 to 2023 alongside Virginia Trioli and Stan Grant

Hamish MacDonald (pictured) replaced Jones as a host in 2020 but resigned in July 2021 after overwhelming personal abuse and trolling on social media

Virginia Trioli, the co-host of ABC News Breakfast, also hosted Q&A in 2021 and 2022

Calls have mounted for ABC’s lowest rating program Q&A to be scrapped for good as the show is slammed as ‘one-sided, uninteresting and rarely funny’ (pictured, former host Stan Grant)

The program now airs at 9.30pm on Monday nights and features a panel of five public figures such as politicians, media personalities and academics. 

After Macdonald resigned in 2021, Q&A was presented by three rotating hosts – Stan Grant, David Speers and Virginia Trioli until July, 2022. 

It was later announced Stan Grant would permanently host the show from August 1. 

However, less than a year later the host resigned in May 2023 after receiving ‘grotesque racist abuse’ and threats to his safety. 

The abuse came after Grant criticised the monarchy while on an ABC panel discussion that preceded the coronation of King Charles III. 

Grant was disappointed by the lack of support he received from the ABC. 

He said that during the May 6 panel discussion ‘no one shouted over anyone, no one abused anyone’ and that it had been a healthy, respectful and constructive debate about the history of the monarchy.

‘If a white person had been on air… if they talked about invasion of the land, they just would not have been abused in the way that I was,’ he said.

‘It wasn’t just what I was saying, it was the fact I was saying (it). The racial abuse and attacks began before I had even uttered a word.’ 

Q&A is currently hosted by ABC breakfast radio presenter Patricia Karvelas (pictured)

Q&A is currently hosted by ABC breakfast radio presenter Patricia Karvelas.

A discussion on the deepening crisis in Israel and Palestine didn’t make it in to the top 20 rated programs for Monday night.

Twitter users debated whether Q&A should be scrapped in 2024. 

‘The problem is the hosting the last few years. Pre-2020, when Tony Jones was the host it was a show worth watching,’ one said. 

‘I liked it better without the audience. Watched it on ABC iView the next morning. Though I rarely watch it,’ a second tweeted. 

‘The ABC spent a lot of effort getting the tone right in last nights Q&A. They did well,’ a third wrote.  

‘Q&A rates better than anything on Sky News after 6pm, even with a captive rural audience,’ a fourth tweeted. 

‘If only ratings matters on TV it’ll just end up being gambling & porn.’

On Tuesday, Channel 10 announced it was scrapping Studio 10 after a decade on TV.