More than eight million people tuned in to watch Tourette's sufferer Pete Bennett win Big Brother, according to viewing figures released today.

The tense finale, which which saw the 24-year-old walk off with the £100,000 top prize, was watched by a peak audience of 8.2 million viewers - a 45.6 per cent share of the total number of available television viewers.

It was the highest-rated show of the series - the second highest being the May 18 launch night which attracted an average of 7.1 million viewers.

The average figure for last night's 10pm show was 7.7 million - an increase on the 2005 finale which was watched by an average of 6.7 million. While the unofficial peak figures were in line with those of recent Big Brother finals, it fell some way short of the record 9.5 million for the first series in 2000.

Throughout the marathon 13-week series, which saw housemates cooped up with one another for the longest ever period of time, a total of £1.2 million was raised for charity through telephone voting.

Some £257,365 of that came from the controversial vote to return ex-housemates to the house. An investigation was launched after thousands of viewers complained that they were being asked to vote and pay again to keep out contestants they had already evicted.

If the show is found to have breached the code of conduct regulating the use of premium phone lines, viewers could be entitled to their money back.

Pete, an unemployed rock'n'roll singer from Brighton, jumped around the room swearing and shouting after host Davina McCall announced that he had beaten Welsh lifeguard Glyn to claim the reality TV show's crown last night.

Pete, who enlivened proceedings with his regular shouts of "w*****!", won 61.2 per cent of the votes in the final showdown.

In his interview with the presenter he said appearing on Big Brother had saved his life. He has previously said he would spend his prize money paying off his mum's mortgage.