The Apprentice (British TV series) series 6

The sixth series of British reality television series The Apprentice was broadcast in the UK on BBC One, from 6 October to 19 December 2010. Due to the 2010 General Election, which Alan Sugar had political ties with following his appointment as a Lord within the House of Lords, the BBC postponed the series' broadcast until autumn of that year to preserve the broadcaster's strict political impartiality rules.
The sixth series was the last to offer a six-figure job as a prize. It is also the first series to feature Karren Brady in the role of Sugar's aide, after an initial appearance in this role for the first series of Young Apprentice; Mountford retained a role within series 6 as an interviewer in the Interviews stage. Alongside the standard twelve episodes, two specials were aired alongside this series – "The Final Five" on 9 December; and "Why I Fired Them" on 16 December.
Sixteen candidates took part in the sixth series, with Stella English winning the competition. However, after describing her winning role in Lord Sugar's employ as being no more than an "overpaid lackey", significant changes were made to the prize in later series. Excluding the specials, the series averaged around 7.87 million viewers during its broadcast.

Series overview

After receiving applications from all over the country, production staff held regional auditions and interviews throughout July 2009, followed by a second round of interviews and assessments in London to determine the final selection of sixteen candidates. Prior to work beginning on the series, Karren Brady replaced Margaret Mountford as one of Lord Sugar's aides. Her appointment was given a trial run during the production and broadcast of the first series of Young Apprentice, before it was finalised for the main programme. Meanwhile, Mountford agreed to appear as an interviewer in the Interviews stage.
Filming for the sixth series began in Autumn 2009, with a projected air date of March 2010. However, the announcement that a General Election would be taking place in May of that year meant that the broadcaster had to postpone the series until the start of October, due to Sugar's then-official ties with the Labour government at the time. In a statement made about the postponement of the sixth series, Sugar revealed that running it during the General Election would have been a risk to the broadcaster's political impartiality rules, due in part to his recent appointment as a Lord in the House of Lords earlier that year; this also explained the altering of his address from "Sir Alan" in previous series, to "Lord Sugar" from series 6 onwards.
The series finale saw a crossover episode between The Apprentice and its sister show, The Apprentice: You're Fired!, on BBC One. The episode was formatted with a short intro by the host of You're Fired, before leading onto the series finale of the main show, to be immediately followed by the full episode of You're Fired!; subsequent repeats of the series finale only included the main show's episode. Production staff later decided to create subsequent crossover finales of the two episodes in future series, after finding the crossover format to appeal to viewers.
The team names for the series were Synergy and ''Apollo''. Prior to the start of filming for the second episode, Raleigh Addington was forced to drop out of the show after a member of his family was badly injured while on active duty in the British armed forces. His departure meant that Sugar had to avoid multiple firings outside of the Interviews stage. Of those who remained, Stella English would become the eventual winner, whereupon she remained in Sugar's employment until issues began to surface in May 2011, whilst working for his company Viglen. Complaining that she required a new role, as the existing one made her work like a "glorified PA" for Sugar, her contract was not renewed. After unsuccessfully suing Sugar, she would later face financial difficulties, before eventually securing work with crowdfunding TV channel Crowd Box TV.

Performance chart

'''Key:'''

Episodes

Controversy

Behaviour of Stella English after filming
Following the sixth series conclusion, production staff became concerned with the behaviour of Stella English after she had won the contest. A few days after winning a job under Alan Sugar, English quit her post after deeming it to be "a sham" employment. Shortly after her resignation, she complained against her former employer's response to her decision and subsequently attempted to sue him for constructive dismissal. Both Sugar and the producers disapproved of the negative media attention that English brought about after her case was dismissed, and agreed during a meeting that the format of The Apprentice could not continue for the next series. As a result, the format underwent a complete revamp before production began on the seventh series.

Ratings

Official episode viewing figures are from BARB.

Episode no.	Airdate	Viewers	BBC One weekly ranking
1	6 October 2010	7.65	7
2	13 October 2010	8.10	7
3	20 October 2010	7.53	8
4	27 October 2010	6.49	10
5	3 November 2010	8.20	7
6	10 November 2010	7.56	9
7	17 November 2010	7.71	7
8	24 November 2010	8.07	6
9	1 December 2010	7.53	8
10	8 December 2010	8.14	7
11	15 December 2010	8.77	9
12	19 December 2010	8.63	10