And the joint winners are... AFTER a record number of submissions providing some truly exceptional examples of investigative journalism, the judges of the Paul Foot Award for Campaigning Journalism 2008 decided to increase the prize money and split this year’s award between two outstanding journalists.
Ian Hislop, editor of Private Eye, said: “In these difficult economic times the Paul Foot Award is proud to offer two winners for the price of one! The standard was so high this year that the judges had to give a joint award, shared by a forensic financial investigation into a government scandal and a dogged critical campaign against legal injustice. Both are firmly in the tradition of first-rate journalism that Paul exemplified.”
Alan Rusbridger, editor of the Guardian, commented: “I think Paul would have admired the two winners for very different reasons. Richard Brooks is a digger and a troublemaker who niggles away at difficult subjects in a meticulous, punchy and highly effective way. Camilla Cavendish would have appealed to Paul’s campaigning heart for the way in which she pursued one story through thick and thin. Both are extremely worthy winners in the Foot tradition.”
Richard Brooks
Private
Eye
Early in 2007 Richard Brooks discovered, buried
away in a memo submitted to a Public Accounts
Committee inquiry into the government’s
management of shareholdings in various corporations,
a highly valuable but largely unheard of fund
management company called Actis. Brooks then wrote
a series
of articles exposing the sale of
a key government international development business
to the organisation’s own management for
a fraction of its value, and the transformation
of an effective development body into a money-making
machine for executives at the expense of the world’s
poor.
Camilla Cavendish
The
Times
The outrageous miscarriages of justice which are
being perpetrated on children, because unaccountable
social workers are removing them from parents
in closed courts with virtually no scrutiny, have
been raised before. But in a series of articles
for the Times, Camilla Cavendish provided a more
detailed analysis of the many injustices which
result from the Children Act 1989 and from the
professional cultures which have grown up around
child “protection”. She did so in
a sustained way which will force the authorities
to think again. The Times’ wider campaign
included several leading articles on various aspects
of the issue. Many disparate campaign groups were
encouraged to put their links on the Times website,
and urged readers to email their MP. Hundreds
of readers have done so, and the letters those
MPs have written to Jack Straw have put real pressure
on the Ministry of Justice.
Andrew Gilligan, Evening Standard, whose investigation exposed the so-called “Lee Jasper affair”, serious financial irregularities in London’s City Hall and the London Development agency, involving a senior aide to the then mayor, Ken Livingstone. The investigation has so far resulted in six police inquiries, seven arrests and Mr Jasper’s resignation and was credited by some, including Mr Livingstone, with his defeat in the recent mayoral election.
Warwick Mansell, Times
Educational Supplement, who wrote
extensively about the government’s school
testing/exams regime, including the first major
story on the Sats test marking scandal which led
to the late return of thousands of pupils’
test papers and the sacking of test contractor
ETS Europe, and the first story bringing together
opposition across the education profession to
the government’s league tables/targets/testing
regime of school accountability.
Dan McDougall, The
Observer’s South Asia Correspondent,
whose undercover investigations in India, Pakistan,
Nepal and Bangladesh led to the shaming of three
of the world’s top five retailers, Esprit,
Primark and Gap Inc, for using children in their
supply chains. All three firms sacked or fined
major suppliers, cancelled millions of pounds
worth of contracts and launched multi-million
pound social funds.
Jim Oldfield, Rossington Community Newsletter, South Yorkshire Newspapers, who, long before Fleet Street had ever heard of eco-towns, started chronicling the activities of a group of landowners and speculators to plant one in the village of Rossington – Rossington Eco-Town - apparently against the wishes of 13,000-odd residents.
The judges for this year’s award were, in alphabetical order: Clare Fermont, Bill Hagerty, Ian Hislop, Richard Ingrams, Brian MacArthur (chair), Alan Rusbridger, and Michelle Stanistreet.
The Paul Foot Award was set up in memory of revered investigative journalist Paul Foot, who died in 2004.
Paul Foot, an investigative journalist, editor and left-wing campaigner, worked variously for the Daily Record, the Daily Mirror, The Guardian and Private Eye. He was involved in many high-profile campaigns throughout his illustrious career, including the Birmingham Six, the Bridgewater Four and the John Poulson scandal. His accolades include the Journalist of the Year, the Campaigning Journalist of the Year, the George Orwell Prize for Journalism and in 2000 he was honoured as the Campaigning Journalist of the Decade.
Paul Foot died in 2004 at the age of 66.
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