"When things go wrong, they blame the referee": José Pablo López dismantles attacks against RTVE's audiences

José Pablo López has taken advantage of his appearance in Congress this Monday to clearly debunk the hoax that attributes to RTVE or the Government the ability to manipulate audience meters. The president of the corporation has recalled something as elemental as it is decisive in this controversy. Public television is measured with exactly the same system as Antena 3, Telecinco, and the rest of the channels.

The response came during the Joint Parliamentary Control Commission of RTVE, after leaders of the Popular Party and several media outlets had cast suspicion on the figures achieved by La 1. López has denounced a "savage smear campaign" aimed at eroding the good results of public television and has responded with an explanation difficult to dispute.

"The same panel of audience meters used to measure 'El Hormiguero' or Ana Rosa's program is used to measure Televisión Española," he emphasized. The measurement comes from Fifty5Blue, the former Kantar Media, an external company that works with household panels and independent data for the entire audiovisual market. RTVE therefore lacks its own system that it can alter at will.

The same system when some win and when RTVE wins

López has even suggested that a representative of the company appear in the Senate to explain how audience meters work and put an end to the conspiracy theories being spread around them. His intervention has mixed technical explanation with a direct political response to those who question the method only since La 1 has regained ground.

The president of RTVE has recommended to the Popular Party that it address its doubts to the very media figures with whom it maintains a good relationship. Pablo Motos and Ana Rosa Quintana regularly publish and celebrate their audience results, obtained through the same panel that some sectors now present as unreliable when it benefits public television.

"When things go well for them, positive headlines can be made, but when things go badly for them, we blame the referee," summarized López, who compared this reaction to the habit of questioning the legitimacy of a result when the winner is not the expected one.

The head of RTVE also ironized about those who believe that any programming problem is solved "by broadcasting bullfights". Viewers, he recalled, are looking for a broader offer, and the growth of a channel depends on its ability to succeed with information, entertainment, fiction, culture, and sports content.

The attacks come with La 1 at its best moment in years

The offensive against the audience meters coincides with an unquestionable recovery of public television. La 1 closed June with a 14.3% share, its best result in that month since 2011, after growing 3.6 points in a year and leading the second channel by 1.8 points. The full season ended with 12.2%, La 1's highest figure in 14 years.

The progress has extended to news programs, morning shows, afternoons, prime time, and La 2. The Telediarios also experienced their largest year-on-year growth in their history during June, while information and entertainment formats have once again competed for leadership against private channels.

This success explains, according to López, the virulence of some of the criticism. The president has accused a very specific political and media sector of trying to "destroy the success of public television" and has lamented that a historic medium like 'ABC' has gone so far as to insinuate that RTVE cheats in the measurement.

The corporation's top executive closed his speech by also pointing to regional television channels administered by PP governments. As he explained, these channels collectively cost more than 600 million euros a year and none of them have surpassed La 1's results during 2026.

"The same instrument, the ballot box or the audimeter, is claimed or questioned as convenient. When it suits me, it's valid. When it doesn't suit me, it's not valid," he concluded.