Reach chief executive Jim Mullen has written to staff saying “I have kept my word” on job cuts at the group as parts of the business enact redundancies.

Mullen previously wrote to staff at the start of 2024 to say that, after making more than 700 job cuts in 2023, the business planned to end 2024 with “the teams that we have starting the year”.

However recent weeks have seen team restructures and consequent redundancies at titles including the Sunday Express, Scotland’s Sunday Mail and the Irish Sunday Mirror.

In each case the Sunday titles have been moved into a seven-day merged print and digital operation, with a resulting loss of jobs.

Sunday Express editor David Wooding has left Reach as part of the changes, The Guardian has reported, and Sunday Mail editor Lorna Hughes has also elected to leave according to an email seen by Hold the Front Page.

The NUJ Reach group chapel said the recent redundancies “concern more than two dozen talented journalists leaving the company”.

“Our members are mindful of Jim Mullen’s words as we entered 2024 about staff not having ‘one eye over their shoulder’ after a corrosive year of hundreds of lost journalists’ jobs.

“Yet that is exactly what is happening currently, particularly if you are in a print-facing role…

“The constant threat of cutbacks, particularly among the national titles, is a major source of demotivation and drain on morale. This group chapel calls on the company to make 2025 a redundancy-free, growth year at Reach.”

Separately on Friday, Daily Mirror editor-in-chief Caroline Waterston emailed staff saying the staff of the daily newspaper will be merged with that of celebrity magazine OK!. Waterston, who was previously editor of OK!, added the brands “will remain completely distinct” and that she did “not expect this change to result in any reduction in roles”.

Reach CEO says company will end 2024 with more staff than at conclusion of 2023 restructure

On Friday November 22 Mullen emailed staff saying “external commentary” on the company was “noisy, distracting and, to be honest, a bit lazy at times”.

His commitment for 2024, he said, “was about growth, that there would be no more large-scale cuts and that the size of the overall business was about right for the year ahead.

“I have kept my word and have not changed this commitment.

“And I’ve kept my commitment to being upfront with you all about the fact that our business will have to evolve, adapt and continue to change to better suit the changing preferences of our audiences, their chosen channels and our advertisers.”

Last month Reach announced it would be hiring 60 new editorial staff with a focus on “audience writers” and “general assignment journalists” who will cover breaking stories and trending topics. Mullen said this meant the company will conclude 2024 “with more jobs than we had at the conclusion of the 2023 restructure programme”.

“This is not to disparage or dismiss the feelings of colleagues whose roles have been impacted by changes that are part of the running of our business…

“As CEO, I understand that it is my role to make decisions that are not always popular but that I believe are right for the business. I recognise that, at times, it means I won’t win any popularity contests, but I will never shirk from being up front and honest with you.”

In its statement earlier in the week, the NUJ Reach group chapel said the 60 new roles were “of course welcomed.

“But our members cannot avoid the feeling that in some way sacrifices are being made in print – where three quarters of Reach’s revenue still comes from – to fund changes the company wants elsewhere. This is no reflection on anyone being recruited to Reach, but does lead to speculation on the wisdom of the actions being taken.”

There has been a move away from standalone Sunday editorial teams across the news industry. Last year News UK proposed a merger of the Scottish Times and Scottish Sunday Times and Mail Newspapers brought the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday “much closer together”.

Several dedicated Sunday operations continue, however, including The Sunday Times, The Observer and The Sunday Telegraph, as well as FT Weekend and i weekend.

The post Reach ends year with more redundancies but reports net increase in staff appeared first on Press Gazette.

Press Gazette is honoured to announce the finalists for the British Journalism Awards 2024.

This year’s British Journalism Awards attracted 750 entries encompassing every major news organisation in the UK.

The finalists are announced today following a three-week process involving 80 independent judges and two days of jury-style meetings.

In order to make the shortlists work has to be revelatory, show journalistic skill and rigour and serve the public interest.

The winners will be announced on 12 December at a dinner in London hosted by Radio 2 presenter and journalist Jeremy Vine.

Details here about how to book tickets.

The shortlist for News Provider of the Year will be announced following a second round of judging. The winners of Journalist of the Year, the Marie Colvin Award and the Public Service prize will be announced on the night.

Chairman of judges and Press Gazette editor-in-chief Dominic Ponsford said: “Without journalism, Boris Johnson would still be prime minister, wronged postmasters would not have a voice and victims of the infected blood scandal would not have a chance of compensation.

“The 2024 British Journalism Awards shortlists celebrate the stories which would not be told without journalists willing to shine a light on uncomfortable truths and publications brave enough to back them up.

“Congratulations to all our finalists and thank you to everyone who took the time to enter the British Journalism Awards.

“In a media world which is increasingly controlled by a few parasitic technology platforms it is more important than ever to celebrate the publishers willing to invest in and support quality journalism that makes a difference for the better in our world.”

British Journalism Awards 2024 shortlist in full:

Social Affairs, Diversity & Inclusion Journalism

Natasha Cox, Ahmed El Shamy, Rosie Garthwaite — BBC Eye Investigations

• Perfume’s Dark Secret

Jessica Hill — Schools Week

• Missing from mainstream: Excluded children with nowhere to go
• ‘Out of sight, out of mind’: The rise of unregistered alternative provision
• Hospital schools: On the mental health crisis frontline

Sasha Baker, Valeria Rocca — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

• The parents group at the centre of a rollback of trans rights
• ‘One day they may thank us for that “abuse”’: Inside the Bayswater Support Group

Rianna Croxford, Ruth Evans, Cate Brown, Ed McGown, Tom Stone, Ed Campbell, Karen Wightman — BBC Panorama

• The Abercrombie Guys: The Dark Side of Cool

Daniel Hewitt, Imogen Barrer, Mariah Cooper, Reshma Rumsey — ITV News

• Nowhere to go: Britain’s homeless emergency

Louise Tickle — Tortoise Media

• Taking the stand: Grace’s story
• Taking the stand: Emma’s story

Abi Kay — Farmers Weekly

• Level the Field
• Is there a problem with young farmer culture?
• Editor’s view: Facing hard truths about young farmer culture

Joshua Nelken-Zitser, Ida Reihani, Kit Gillet — Business Insider

• Iran will pay for gender-transition surgery, but it comes at a cost — your dignity

Features Journalism

Sophie Elmhirst — 1843 magazine, The Economist and The Guardian

• The last stand of the call-centre worker
• Chortle chortle, scribble scribble: inside the Old Bailey with Britain’s last court reporters
• Last love: a romance in a care home

Jenny Kleeman — The Guardian

• America’s premier pronatalists on having ‘tons of kids’ to save the world: ‘There are going to be countries of old people starving to death’
• She was accused of faking an incriminating video of teenage cheerleaders. She was arrested, outcast and condemned. The problem? Nothing was fake after all
• ‘I know someone who played noughts and crosses on one’: meet the top surgeon who burned his initials on a patient’s liver

Sirin Kale — The Guardian

• ‘My child was drowning’: life and death on an English maternity ward
• The life and tragic death of John Balson: how a true crime producer documented his own rising horror
• The Russell murders: is Michael Stone in prison for a brutal crime he didn’t commit?

Zoe Beaty — The Independent

• How Nigel Farage took over my hometown – and why Keir Starmer should be worried
• My battle to bring a predatory Met Police officer from the same unit as Wayne Couzens to justice
• ‘A court packed with those who know their way around already, and jails are too full to take them’

Inderdeep Bains — Daily Mail

• My doctors insist it’s time I died – but I will fight them: Extraordinary case of 19-year-old woman suffering from Charlie Gard condition battling medics’ attempts to ‘condemn her to death’
• Sudiksha: ‘Condemned to Die in Secret’ – The Shocking Story of the 19-year-old’s fight to live

David James Smith — The Independent

• How did so many miss the sinister warning signs about James Bulger’s killer for so long?
• Is Lucy Letby innocent? I’m a miscarriage of justice investigator – and here’s what I think…
• The wife of this Murdoch executive has been missing since the Sixties – will her body now be found?

Fiona Hamilton — The Times

• Nottingham attacks: ‘We have no faith in the police. We want justice’
• ‘A horrible way to die … and no doctors can help you’
• Realising Sarah Everard got into a sex offender’s car was horrific

Barbara McMahon — Daily Mail

• Ghislaine Maxwell ‘was tortured in prison – now she’s ready for a comeback’: Jeffrey Epstein’s socialite pimp runs half marathons at low-security Florida lock-up and is now ‘focused and motivated’ for her appeal next week, her brother reveals
• ‘I shook Epstein’s hand and asked him what my daughter would be doing’: Virginia Roberts’s father describes dropping her off at paedophile’s mansion, meeting ‘despicable’ Ghislaine… and blasts Prince Andrew for showing ‘no remorse’
• Black Widow who ‘relished killing and had no regard for human life, even for children’: Griselda Blanco shot a child in the head when she was 11 and rose to be Miami’s drug kingpin. As she’s immortalised on Netflix, her son recalls his ‘fearsome’ mother

Local Journalism

Abi Whistance, Joshi Herrmann, Kate Knowles, Mollie Simpson, Jothi Gupta — Mill Media

• Special investigation: The collapsing world of Liverpool’s charity kingpin
• Investigation: The spectacular rise and sudden fall of Gurpaal Judge
• Exclusive: How did a semi in Harpurhey sell for £1.8m?

Richard Newman, Jennifer O’Leary, Gwyneth Jones, Chris Thornton — BBC Spotlight

• Katie: Coerced and Killed

Sam McBride — Belfast Telegraph

• Lough Neagh has become a scene of Biblical disaster, and Stormont was central to its destruction
• Killing Edgar podcast

Chris Burn — The Yorkshire Post

• Building societies scandal: Yorkshire victims reveal shocking stories – and plead for action to be taken
• Philips Trust: FCA got ‘Ponzi scheme’ warning on firm at heart of £138m building society scandal – 18 months before collapse
• Leeds, Newcastle and Nottingham Building Societies to pay tens of millions to Philips Trust victims

Jane Haynes — Birmingham Mail and Birmingham Mail/Post

• Teacher’s ‘life blown apart’ in onslaught of hate as false racism claim goes viral
• The truth exposed about ‘secretive’ council meeting on equal pay crisis in Birmingham
• ‘Like a prison’ – the tower block for homeless families that has 8pm curfew and no visitors allowed

Wendy Robertson — The Bridge

• The Bridge newsletter

Health & Life Sciences Journalism

Rebecca Thomas — The Independent

• Mental health patients ‘raped and sexually assaulted’ as NHS abuse scandal revealed
• Nicholas’s story: ‘I’ve been locked up for 10 years because I’m autistic. Is a chance at life too much to ask?’
• Revealed: NHS regulator’s ‘culture of fear’ that leaves rogue nurses free to abuse patients

Fin Johnston — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

• Science for sale: Philip Morris’s web of payments to fund tobacco research
• Inside the strategy doc Philip Morris never meant you to see
• Tobacco state: why Japan was the perfect testing ground for Philip Morris

Hannah Barnes — The New Statesman

• The trauma ward
• The Cass Review into children’s gender care should shame us all
• Hundreds of doctors are challenging the BMA’s stance on puberty blockers

Robbie Boyd, Eamonn Matthews, Steve Grandison, Ian Bendelow, Sophie Borland, Katie O’Toole, Islay Stacey, Ali Watt, Frances Peters — Quicksilver Media for Channel 4 Dispatches

• Undercover A&E: NHS in Crisis

Ellie Pitt, Cree Haughton, Justina Simpson, Ellie Swinton, Patrick Russell, Liam Ayers — ITV News

• The Dark Side of Cosmetic Surgery

Martin Bagot — Daily Mirror

• Day in the life of a dentist – and why it’s nothing like you imagine as NHS nears collapse
• Britain’s dental health crisis exposed as hundreds of children in hospital with bad teeth
• Urgent warning amid fears cosmetic fillers could cause immune system problems

Hanna Geissler — Daily Express

• ‘I’m terminally ill – assisted dying must be legalised so my daughter won’t see me suffer’
• Assisted dying ‘allowed me to mostly forget’ fears, says Aussie man hit by brain tumour
• Dame Esther’s assisted dying petition delivered to Prime Minister’s doorstep

Crime & Legal Affairs Journalism

Sue Mitchell, Rob Lawrie, Joel Moors, Winifred Robinson, Dan Clarke, Philip Sellars, Tom Brignell, Mom Tudie — BBC

• To Catch a Scorpion
• How we found Europe’s most wanted migrant-smuggler
• Why the BBC could track down a people-smuggling kingpin before the police

Gabriel Pogrund, Katie Tarrant — The Sunday Times

• Millionaire’s ‘sex worker immigration scandal’
• Hamish Ogston: millionaire accused of exploiting women ‘set up charity to help win knighthood’
• Hamish Ogston: tycoon asked Met to arrest woman who accused him of sex trafficking

Mike Sullivan, Jerome Starkey, Mike Ridley — The Sun

• ‘Distraught’ Holly Willoughby under police guard after man is arrested over terrifying ‘kidnap plot’
• Police chief faces ‘Walter Mitty’ probe after being pictured wearing Falklands medal despite being 15 at time of war

Hannah Summers — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

• Family Court Files: mother ‘devastated’ after rapist father granted contact with child
• Family Court Files: Psychologist’s evidence used to ‘ramp up’ allegations of parental alienation
• Kristoffer White: TBIJ wins court battle to publish name of sex offender

Rianna Croxford, Ruth Evans — BBC Panorama and BBC News

• Abercrombie & Fitch ex-CEO accused of exploiting men for sex
• Lawsuit accuses Abercrombie & Fitch of funding sex-trafficking operation
• FBI investigate after ex-Abercrombie boss sex claims

Isobel Yeung, Alex Nott, Esme Ash, Nick Parnes, Alistair Jackson, Matt Bardo, Sarah Wilson — Channel 4 Dispatches

• Britain’s Unsolved Crimewave: Dispatches

Comment Journalism

Daniel Finkelstein — The Times

• Israelis and Palestinians must start to listen
• Wes Streeting’s lessons from Richard Nixon and China
• Here’s the Keir Starmer I’ve known for decades

Matthew Syed — The Sunday Times

• When I was at school a teacher could call me the P-word. We’ve come so far
• The storm is gathering, and Europe is still dithering on defending itself
• Locked in by language, we are freed by music, poetry, painting … and love

Will Hayward — WalesOnline/The Will Hayward Newsletter

• The most pointless job in Wales
• The worst political leader in the UK
• Bluster, fluster and ‘word salad’ nonsense: Vaughan Gething ducks and weaves like a boxer at the Welsh Covid Inquiry

Kitty Donaldson — i

• Part political update, part group therapy: inside Starmer’s Cabinet meeting
• Grenfell is a tragic reminder to the Tories that regulation is not a dirty word
• The winter fuel row is a painful wake up call for new Labour MPs

Frances Ryan — The Guardian

• A summer defined by men killing women and girls. This can’t go on
• Think of this: a plan to ‘warehouse’ disabled people. What kind of nation is Britain becoming?
• Cropped out, banned, airbrushed: the school photos that show the ugly face of Britain today

Duncan Robinson — The Economist

• Why the next Westminster scandal is already here
• The narcissism of minor differences, Labour Party edition
• British boomers are losing out for the first time

Specialist Journalism

Peter Blackburn — The Doctor (by the British Medical Association)

• Nowhere left to turn
• Fears for patient care due to shortages of chronic alcohol misuse treatment Pabrinex
• Not the only failing

Lucinda Rouse, Emily Burt, Ollie Peart, Louise Hill, David Robinson, Rebecca Cooney, Andy Ricketts, Nav Pal, Til Owen — Third Sector

• The End of Charity podcast

Lucie Heath — i

• Revealed: Water firms dumped sewage 5,500 times in a year ‘illegally’
• Revealed: The hidden sewage spills damaging our national parks and beauty spots
• Toxic water, debt and sewage dumping: How Britain’s rivers got so bad

Deborah Cohen, Margaret McCartney — BMJ/Pharmaceutical Journal

• Inclisiran: the ‘extremely unusual’ political influence behind the novel drug’s approval
• Galleri promises to detect multiple cancers—but new evidence casts doubt on this much hyped blood test
• Inclisiran: Government’s strategy to promote cholesterol lowering drug after Brexit was “spectacular failure,” says insider

Lee Mottershead — Racing Post

• Revealed: the racehorse owner fronting an illegal bookmaker with more than 1,000 customers
• ‘People don’t want to provide bank statements. We’ve got so many people betting with us’

Jessica Hill — Schools Week

• The rise of the parent activist
• AI’s allure is proving hard to resist for the UK’s learners
• ‘Out of sight, out of mind’: The rise of unregistered alternative provision

Emily Townsend — Health Service Journal

• Over 30 sepsis deaths linked to ‘systemic’ failings, investigation reveals
• Revealed: Doubling of average waits for critical stroke treatments
• Midwives call women in labour ‘Asian princesses’ amid ‘hostile’ environment fears

Roya Nikkhah — The Sunday Times

• Prince Harry at 40: ‘All he does is spend time looking back’
• The hospital heart-to-hearts that brought Kate and King even closer
• Prince William to build houses for homeless on his land in Cornwall

Foreign Affairs Journalism

Christina Lamb — The Sunday Times

• Gun in hand, the Israeli settler tells the Palestinian: I will kill you
• First Hamas fighters raped her. Then they shot her in the head
• ‘Who will protect us?’: Christina Lamb on the Yazidis’ dangerous journey home

Alex Crawford — Sky News

• Libya floods: Child’s voice heard under rubble as rescue teams search desperately in Derna for survivors
• Warning of Islamic State’s growing resurgence – as Sky News gets rare access to terrorists’ families
• Report from Lebanon

Kim Sengupta — The Independent

• Bombs, betrayal and burying loved ones: Plight of one Ukraine village illustrates toll of Russia’s invasion
• ‘I have buried more than 50 friends’: My life as a British soldier fighting on Ukraine’s bloody front line
• The families of hostages taken by Hamas are desperate – but can Israel get them back?

Vanessa Bowles, Jaber Badwan — Channel 4 Dispatches

• Kill Zone: Inside Gaza

Louise Callaghan — The Sunday Times

• The secret city of tunnels where hundreds live below Vegas glitz
• Claudia Sheinbaum: Meet the woman ready to be Mexico’s first presidenta
• Stand-off at Eagle Pass: welcome to the epicentre of the US border crisis

Secunder Kermani — Channel 4 News

• Palestinian detainees allege torture and sexual abuse by Israeli captors
• Myanmar military forces victims to fight in brutal civil war

Gesbeen Mohammad, Brad Manning, Nechirvan Mando, Ghoncheh Habibiazad, Esella Hawkey, Tom Giles, Hafez — ITV

• Inside Iran: The Fight for Freedom

Stuart Ramsay, Dominique van Heerden, Toby Nash — Sky News

• Haiti gang boss will take part in talks if invited – but warns foreign forces will be treated as ‘invaders’
• Aboard ‘The Beast’: What do migrants face travelling through Mexico on way to US?
• Shocking scenes in Gaza hospital as IDF moves into Khan Younis | Israel-Hamas war

Arkady Ostrovsky — 1843 magazine, The Economist

• Life and death in Putin’s gulag
• Death and destruction in a Russian city
• Life and fate (podcast)

Technology Journalism, sponsored by Amazon

Alexander Martin — The Record from Recorded Future News

• Ransomware attacks hit record level in UK, according to neglected official data
• UK government urged to get on ‘forward foot’ with ransomware instead of ‘absorbing the punches’
• Exclusive: UK to propose mandatory reporting for ransomware attacks and licensing regime for all payments

Marianna Spring — BBC News

• The real story of the news website accused of fuelling riots
• Trump supporters target black voters with faked AI images
• X takes action on deepfake network smearing UK politicians after BBC investigation

Joe Tidy — BBC World Service

• ‘Pig butchering’ scammers target BBC reporter
• Sextortion warning: In six hours, my son was dead
• Stolen test data and NHS numbers published by hospital hackers

Amanda Chicago Lewis — 1843 magazine, The Economist

• Secrets of a ransomware negotiator

Cathy Newman, Job Rabkin, Emily Roe, Sophie Braybrook, Guy Basnett, Ed Howker — Channel 4 News

• Deepfake Porn

Helen Lewis — BBC Radio 4/BBC Sounds

• Helen Lewis Has Left the Chat

Energy & Environment Journalism, sponsored by Renewable UK

Sam McBride — Belfast Telegraph

• Apocalypse Neagh: The source of 40% of NI’s water is ‘dying’
• Watch: Sam McBride’s in-depth look at Lough Neagh’s blue-green algae crisis

Josephine Moulds — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

• Backroom deals, mystery companies and a ‘killer lake’: inside DRC’s gas and oil auction
• HSBC helped oil and gas industry raise $47bn despite net-zero pledge
• Barclays’ billions of ‘sustainable’ finance for fossil fuel industry is greenwash, says investor

Esme Stallard, Becky Dale, Sophie Woodcock, Jonah Fisher, Libby Rogers — BBC News

• Water firms illegally spilled sewage on dry days – data suggests
• BBC uncovers 6,000 possible illegal sewage spills in one year

Rachel Salvidge, Leana Hosea — The Guardian/Watershed

• The Watershed Pollution Map
• Landfills across England could be leaking harmful toxic ooze, warn experts
• ‘It’s a poison and it’s killing us’: the hidden dangers of old UK landfills

Guy Grandjean, Patrick Fee, Gwyneth Jones, Chris Thornton — BBC Spotlight Northern Ireland

• Spotlight – The Lough Neagh Monster
• Hundreds of environmental breaches by Moy Park

Sofia Quaglia — The Guardian

• ‘If we can’t fish any more, we’re going to die’: the volunteer sea patrols protecting precious Philippine waters
• From sea to plate … to sea! Hong Kong puts oyster shells to new use
• ‘It smells so bad’: glut of wild salmon creates stink in Norway and Finland

Jess Staufenberg — SourceMaterial

• Trojan Horsepower – Formula 1 and the Saudi oil lobby
• F1 lobbies for Saudi against EU green rules

Arts & Entertainment Journalism

Mark Daly, Mona McAlinden, Shelley Jofre, Jax Sinclair, Karen Wightman, Hayley Hassall — BBC Panorama

• The Dark Side of Ballet Schools

Jonathan Dean — The Times and The Sunday Times

• Oasis reunion and Wembley gigs next year … is that definitely, maybe?
• Ridley Scott: I didn’t need historians to make my Napoleon epic
• Olly Alexander on Eurovision: ‘I was trying not to have a breakdown’

Rachael Healy — The Guardian and Observer

• ‘At the start you get molested and by 45 you’re too old to work’ – the secret misery of women working in TV
• Fresh crisis at ‘toxic’ Strictly as ex-staff claim they faced sexualised comments and cruelty
• ‘The outrageousness of what Louis CK did is totally lost’: the film about the backlash faced by his accusers

Tom Bryant — Daily Mirror

• BBC’s Huw Edwards scandal teen breaks silence in first interview – ‘I felt groomed’
• Huw Edwards scandal teen: Why I first tried to protect BBC star but now feel shame
• Paul O’Grady’s beloved dog nuzzled star’s shoulder as devoted husband battled to save him

Lucy Osborne, Stephanie Kirchgaessner — The Guardian and Observer

• ‘I honest to God believe I was drugged’: magician David Copperfield’s alleged victims speak out
• The FBI investigated David Copperfield for two years. The claim that he was ‘exonerated’ was widely embraced. Was he?
• ‘Magic David called’: David Copperfield repeatedly contacted Jeffrey Epstein

Clemmie Moodie, Hannah Hope, Scarlet Howes — The Sun

• Strictly pro Giovanni Pernice probed over serious complaints by 3 ‘traumatised’ contestants as BBC ‘gathers evidence’
• Strictly Come Dancing bosses make huge changes to show after Giovanni Pernice quits
• Strictly bombshell as Amanda Abbington demands backstage footage of her and Giovanni as she is diagnosed with PTSD

Carolyn Atkinson, Olivia Skinner — BBC Radio 4 Front Row

• The British Museum’s missing gems
• Painting stolen in art heist more than 30 years ago returned to Glasgow museum

Rosamund Urwin, Charlotte Wace — The Times and The Sunday Times

• Russell Brand accused of rape, sexual assaults and abuse
• How The Times and The Sunday Times investigated Russell Brand
• ‘I felt used and abused’ on Arthur: alleged Russell Brand victim speaks

New Journalist of the Year

Rafe Uddin — Financial Times

• Labour loses Muslim support over stance on Israel-Hamas ceasefire
• Reform UK’s unusual structure with Nigel Farage in the middle
• How Post Office lawyers pushed boundaries in UK sub-postmasters scandal

Sammy Gecsoyler — The Guardian

• ‘We’re going to see people dying on the streets’: homeless refugee crisis grips Liverpool
• ‘Rat bites and chronic asthma’: schools on frontline of UK housing crisis
• Met police agree six-figure payout to student hit by baton at protest

Kaf Okpattah — ITV News, ITV News London

• Whistleblower reveals corruption and collusion inside Wandsworth Prison
• The fraud scammers putting people out of pocket by cloning phone numbers

Simar Bajaj — The Guardian, New Scientist

• Everyone is on their phones. But is it really phone addiction we’re experiencing?
• The surprising mental health and brain benefits of weight-loss drugs
• He was shot in the throat. Now he saves gun victims as a trauma surgeon in Baltimore

Nimra Shahid — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

• Santander arranged billion-dollar oil bond after making green pledge
• Santander weakened fossil fuel policy after raising billions for gas projects

Venetia Menzies — The Sunday Times

• Anxiety drug pregabalin killed my son — and hundreds more are dying from it
• The company taking refugees out of Gaza — and ‘making millions’
• After the earthquake: how Morocco is rebuilding

Oliver Marsden — The Sunday Times/Al Jazeera

• Hero taxi driver who saved scores from Hamas faces hatred from both sides
• Dodging Israeli rockets with Ghana’s UN peacekeepers
• Israeli strikes on Lebanon: Attacks are causing wildfires across south

Yasmin Rufo — BBC News

• London mayor election: Bots, misleading URLs cause voter confusion
• Ulez expansion: Contested claims examined
• Ulez: More than 300 cameras damaged or stolen in four months

Sports Journalism

Jacob Whitehead — The Athletic

• Special report: Newcastle United sponsor Noon and shocking allegations of worker mistreatment
• Saudi Arabia investigates worker mistreatment allegations after The Athletic report on Newcastle sponsor Noon
• Special report: ‘Disturbing’ safety issues at Hillsborough 35 years after disaster

Oliver Brown — The Telegraph

• Angela Carini was sent unforgivably into harm’s way by gutless IOC cowards
• After my grandfather hugged Jesse Owens, the Nazis told him: ‘Never embrace a black man again’
• Michael Vaughan: If I had gone through this racism ordeal at 80, I would have wanted to be shot

Simon Lock, Rob Davies, Jacob Steinberg — The Bureau of Investigative Journalism / The Guardian

• Abramovich’s hidden football deals during Chelsea’s time at the top (TBIJ) and Chelsea FC face new questions over how Roman Abramovich funded success (Guardian)
• ‘I worked for Abramovich?’: footballers were owned by oligarch via offshore deals (TBIJ) and Revealed: Abramovich, the super-agent and the footballers owned as ‘commodities’ (Guardian)
• Leaked documents reveal Abramovich is still connected to Vitesse (TBIJ) and Abramovich loans fund owner of Dutch football club, leaked documents suggest (Guardian)

Jacob Judah — 1843 magazine, The Economist

• The strange case of the disappearing football team

Riath Al-Samarrai — Daily Mail

• Drifting through life without gold medals, tortured by his past, and now claims of bankruptcy… How did petulant Wiggins fall so spectacularly from his golden bike?
• Seb Coe explains why he’s HAPPY to break 128 years of Olympic tradition by handing out cash for gold… and reveals Roman Abramovich’s unlikely role in athletics
• The curious case of Jade Jones’ drugs test and why the Chinese might be quick to ask questions, writes RIATH AL-SAMARRAI

Ian Herbert — Daily Mail

• Looting and rioting, setting fire to police officers and hunting down English fans… fearful European clubs are turning a blind eye to shadowy leaders of their untouchable ultras
• Thirty-five years after horror of the Hillsborough tragedy, Mail Sport can reveal that incredibly the stadium is still not fit for purpose with poor stewarding, inadequate turnstiles and a problem tunnel
• Grubby, classless, the five-year legal battle over plane crash victim Emiliano Sala takes us into football’s sewers… where players are pawns and chronically inept clubs desperately try to save cash

Matt Lawton — The Times

• Man City launch unprecedented legal action against Premier League
• ‘The horror is everywhere’ – inside Lord Coe’s secret trip to Ukraine
• Russian athletes should be allowed at Olympics, says government

Um-E-Aymen Babar — Sky Sports

• How does endometriosis affect women in sport?
• USA cricket teen on tackling social media trolls, South Asian heritage and 2028 Olympic goals
• Um-E-Aymen Babar ok Tiktok

Campaign of the Year

Caroline Wheeler —The Sunday Times: Bloody Disgrace

• Thousands dead, 40 years of cover-up: time for justice for infected blood victims
• At last: promise of £10bn payout for infected blood victims
• Jeremy Hunt: I promised a dying friend I’d end infected blood scandal

Patrick Butler, Josh Halliday, John Domokos — The Guardian: Unpaid Carers

• Carers threatened with prosecution over minor breaches of UK benefit rules
• ‘Injustice’: 92-year-old with dementia told by DWP to repay £7k in disability allowance
• I’m under attack and fighting back: the scandal trapping carers

Computer Weekly editorial team — Computer Weekly: Post Office Scandal

• Post Office Horizon scandal explained: Everything you need to know
• Fujitsu staff instructed how to bid for government contracts during self-imposed ban
• Post Office Horizon replacement project labelled ‘unachievable’ as taxpayer bill reaches £1bn

David Cohen — Evening Standard: Show Respect

• Boys, porn and the alarming way they talk about girls – a special investigation
• School pupils tell how they are victims of sexual harassment every day
• Show some respect: Standard launches campaign with £500k to tackle sexist abuse in schools

Lucie Heath — i: Save Britain’s Rivers

• Save Britain’s Rivers: i challenges all parties to commit to election manifesto
• Revealed: The hidden sewage spills damaging our national parks and beauty spots
• National Trust signs up to i’s Save Britain’s Rivers manifesto

Hanna Geissler, Giles Sheldrick — Daily Express: Give Us Our Last Rights

• My assisted dying petition proves Brits are compassionate – now Rishi Sunak must act
• ‘I’m terminally ill – assisted dying must be legalised so my daughter won’t see me suffer’
• Assisted dying debate must move on to how law will change, MND campaigner says

Amy Clare Martin — The Independent: IPP Jail Sentences

• Revealed: 16 years in prison for stealing a bike and no hope of release – as 7 trapped in jail kill themselves
• ‘He looked like a starving dog on the floor’: Prisoner trapped on indefinite jail term driven to hunger strike
• Father imprisoned for 12 years for stealing mobile phone under ‘cruel’ indefinite jail term reunited with son

Martin Bagot, Jason Beattie — Daily Mirror: Save NHS Dentistry

• Dentists warn ‘rescue plan’ will fail to end crisis as 60,000 people sign our petition
• Day in the life of a dentist – and why it’s nothing like you imagine as NHS nears collapse
• Britain’s dental health crisis exposed as hundreds of children in hospital with bad teeth

Photojournalism

Thomas Dworzak — 1843 magazine, The Economist

André Luís Alves — 1843 magazine, The Economist

Giles Clarke — CNN Digital

Nichole Sobecki — 1843 magazine, The Economist

Dimitris Legakis — Athena Picture Agency

Stefan Rousseau — PA Media

Hannah McKay — Reuters

Interviewer of the Year

Alice Thomson — The Times

• Ed Davey: ‘Being a carer is harder than being a politician’
• Peter Kyle: It was 5am. A woman said, ‘Your partner is dead ’
• Emma Barnett: ‘The pain was so bad, I was losing the will to live’

Christina Lamb — The Sunday Times

• ICC prosecutor: UK didn’t blitz the IRA — Israel needs that restraint
• The president’s daughter (and Instagram star) wanted by Interpol
• David Cameron: ‘Why did I take the job? Rishi Sunak asked!’

Laura Kuenssberg — Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg, BBC News

• Baroness Mone and the PPE Scandal
• How Can We Protect Our Children Online?
• Inside No 11 with Chancellor Rachel Reeves

Charlotte Edwardes — The Guardian

• ‘You asked me questions I’ve never asked myself’: Keir Starmer’s most personal interview yet
• ‘Dismissing global warming? That was a joke’: Jeremy Clarkson on fury, farming and why he’s a changed man
• ‘The levels of attack are extraordinary’: Gary Lineker on punditry, podcasts – and why he won’t stop speaking his mind

Nick Ferrari — LBC

• Labour leader Keir Starmer joins Nick Ferrari to take your calls
• Champagne and caviar: Esther Rantzen reveals plans for final moments as she pushes for assisted dying law change
• Nigel Farage joins Nick Ferrari

Samantha Poling — BBC

• How I confronted Emma Caldwell’s killer
• Catching a Killer: The Murder of Emma Caldwell
• Who Killed Emma?

Piers Morgan — Piers Morgan Uncensored

• “Richard Gadd is PSYCHOTIC” Baby Reindeer’s ‘Real’ Martha Fiona Harvey
• Kevin Spacey Breaks Down As He Faces Debt Of MILLIONS
• Piers Morgan vs Rishi Sunak Round 2 | Prime Minister Discusses Israel-Hamas War, NHS, Rwanda & More

Paul Brand — ITV News

• Interview with Rishi Sunak
• Interview with Ed Davey
• Interview with Keir Starmer

(View all three interviews here)

Politics Journalism

Jim Pickard, Anna Gross — Financial Times

• Keir Starmer accepted £76,000 of freebies including tickets to over 20 football games
• Keir Starmer faces backlash over early failure to disclose £16,200 in donor-funded clothing
• Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves declared clothing donations as office support

Pippa Crerar — The Guardian

• Kemi Badenoch accused of ‘bullying and traumatising’ staff
• Rishi Sunak aide placed bet on election date days before announcement
• Tories putting party reputation before sexual assault claim, says alleged victim

Rowena Mason, Henry Dyer, Matthew Weaver — The Guardian

• Biggest Tory donor said looking at Diane Abbott makes you ‘want to hate all black women’
• ‘No room for the Indians?’: Tory donor Frank Hester suggested staff climb on train roof
• Revealed: Sunak flown to Leeds for private tour of Frank Hester’s office weeks after £5m donation

Job Rabkin, Darshna Soni, Ed Gove, Saif Aledros, Georgina Lee, Lee Sorrell — Channel 4 News

• Undercover Inside Reform’s Campaign

Beth Rigby — Sky News

• Election exit poll
• The Battle for Number 10: A Sky News Leaders’ Special
• How Reform fares on Thursday will also determine the Conservatives fate

Caroline Wheeler — The Sunday Times

• Commons worker arrested after allegedly spying for China
• My MP husband Andrew Bridgen was captured by antivax ‘cult’
• At last: promise of £10bn payout for infected blood victims

Jane Merrick — i

• Thousands of disabled people died after ‘Covid treatment withheld’, inquiry to probe
• ‘My daughter was allowed to die of Covid because she had Down’s syndrome’
• Labour manifesto missing pensioners’ winter fuel and bus pass pledges

Steven Swinford — The Times

• Britain and US launch airstrikes on Houthi targets
• Jeremy Hunt looks for £9bn to balance his budget
• Teachers and nurses should get above-inflation pay rise, ministers told

Business, Finance and Economics Journalism, sponsored by Starling Bank

Simon Murphy — Daily Mirror & Sunday Mirror

• Fujitsu boss lives on ‘blood money’ with £2m mansion as we suffer, says Post Office victim
• Provider boasting of ‘compassion’ threatens daughter with court action over £50k care bill for her 93-year-old amputee mother with dementia
• Mirror tracks down former Post Office IT chief that Horizon inquiry insisted couldn’t be found

Ed Conway — Sky News

• Surge in sale of UK-made cars to Russia’s neighbours shows how it’s beating sanctions
• British firms’ exports are almost certainly bolstering Russia’s war machine in Ukraine, Sky data analysis finds
• How British financial services aid sale of Russian gas on European market | Ukraine War

Tom Bergin — Reuters

• Online-gambling giants conquer U.S. with tactics deemed too tough for Britain

Gill Plimmer, Robert Smith — Financial Times

• Chinese state banks are lenders to Thames Water’s parent company
• Thames Water owners pile group with debt
• Thames Water shareholders backed away over regulator’s debt demands

Siddharth Philip, Benedikt Kammel, Anthony Palazzo, Katharine Gemmell, Sabah Meddings — Bloomberg News

• Bogus Supplier of Jet-Engine Parts May Have Faked Employees Too
• Ghost in the Machine: How Fake Parts Infiltrated Airline Fleets
• UK Fraud Cops Make Arrest in Fake Airplane Parts Scandal

Anna Isaac, Alex Lawson — The Guardian

• Sellafield apologises after guilty plea over string of cybersecurity failings
• Nuclear Narnia: why is Sellafield Europe’s most dangerous industrial site?
• Sellafield nuclear site hacked by groups linked to Russia and China

Danny Fortson — The Sunday Times

• Mike Lynch: Flown to the US in chains, now he is free … and talking
• Inside Mike Lynch’s last stand as $11bn fraud trial looms
• The app that promised an NHS ‘revolution’ then went down in flames

Online Video Journalism

Alex Rothwell, Alastair Good, Yasmin Butt, Pauline Den Hartog Jager, Jack Feeney, Federica De Caria, Kasia Sobocinska, Stephanie Bosset — The Times and The Sunday Times

• Russell Brand accused of rape, sexual assaults and abuse | Investigation
• Undercover in a British prison: security flaws exposed | Times Investigation
• ‘Illegal’ conspiracy theory school exposed | Times Investigation

Andrew Harding — BBC News

• BBC tracks down smuggler behind Channel crossing which killed Sara, 7

Mohamed Ibrahim, Owen Pinnel, Mouna Ba, Wael El-Saadi, Feras Al Ajrami — BBC Eye Investigations

• Gaza 101: Emergency Rescue

Tom Pettifor, Matthew Young, Daniel Dove — Daily Mirror

• Has the man who killed Jill Dando finally been found?
• Jill Dando murder: Man wanted for questioning matches features of Serbian assassin
• Jill Dando murder: Key witness identifies Serbian assassin

Lucinda Herbert, Iain Lynn — National World Video

• Lured To Her Death: The Murder of Sasha Marsden

Reem Makhoul, Robert Leslie, Clancy Morgan, Amelia Kosciulek, Matilda Hay, Liz Kraker, Dorian Barranco, Barbara Corbellini Duarte, Erica Berenstein, Yasser Abu Wazna — Business Insider

• 4 Gazans show how war devastated their coastline

Piers Morgan — Piers Morgan Uncensored

• “Richard Gadd is PSYCHOTIC” Baby Reindeer’s ‘Real’ Martha Fiona Harvey

Ben Marino, Joe Sinclair, Veronica Kan-Dapaah, Petros Gioumpasis, Greg Bobillot — Financial Times

• Chinese brokers launder hundreds of millions for global crime groups | FT Film

Investigation of the Year

Scarlet Howes, Mike Hamilton, Alex West — The Sun

• Ex-BBC presenter Huw Edwards charged with making 37 indecent images of children, ‘shared on WhatsApp’
• Huw Edwards used position of power to groom young people for 6 years even sending pictures from BBC desk to impress them
• We’re still suffering, say parents at centre of Huw Edwards scandal as they slam BBC for lack of answers after he quits

Rosamund Urwin, Charlotte Wace, Paul Morgan-Bentley, Esella Hawkey, Imogen Wynell Mayow, Alice McShane, Florence Kennard, Ian Bendelow, Victoria Noble, Alistair Jackson, Sarah Wilson, Geraldine McKelvie — The Sunday Times, The Times, Hardcash Productions, Channel Four Dispatches Investigations Unit

• Russell Brand accused of rape, sexual assaults and abuse
• How The Times and The Sunday Times investigated Russell Brand
• Russell Brand: In Plain Sight

Alex Thomson, Nanette van der Laan — Channel 4 News

• Post Office Scandal

Paul Morgan-Bentley — The Times

• I worked undercover in one of UK’s most dangerous jails — without checks
• My son died in HMP Bedford. I never felt he was safe there
• Undercover in a British prison: security flaws exposed | Times Investigation

Ruth Evans, Oliver Newlan, Leo Telling, Sasha Hinde, Hayley Clarke, Karen Wightman — BBC Panorama

• Undercover School: Cruelty in the Classroom

Job Rabkin, Darshna Soni, Ed Gove, Saif Aledros, Georgina Lee, Lee Sorrell — Channel 4 News

• Undercover Inside Reform’s Campaign

Holly Bancroft, May Bulman, Monica C. Camacho, Fahim Abed — The Independent and Lighthouse Reports

• At last! Afghan special forces heroes set for sanctuary in UK after government U-turn
• MoD accused of burying admission that UK special forces had power over Afghan sanctuary claims
• Murdered, tortured or in hiding from the Taliban: The special forces abandoned by Britain

Daniel Hewitt, Imogen Barrer, Isabel Alderson-Blench, John Ray — ITV News: The Post Office Tapes

• New secret tape reveals top Post Office lawyer was warned of ‘wrongful’ convictions decade ago
• Secret tape shows Paula Vennells was told about problems with Horizon and warned not to cover it up
• Paula Vennells’ ‘smoking gun’ email reveals Post Office ‘cover-up’

Rowena Mason, Henry Dyer, Matthew Weaver — The Guardian

• Biggest Tory donor said looking at Diane Abbott makes you ‘want to hate all black women’
• No yawning or fingerprints on doors: the strict rules at Tory donor’s firm
• Revealed: Sunak flown to Leeds for private tour of Frank Hester’s office weeks after £5m donation

Samantha Poling, Eamon T. O Connor, Anton Ferrie, Shelley Jofre — BBC Disclosure

• Catching a Killer: The Murder of Emma Caldwell

Scoop of the Year

Russell Brand accused of rape, sexual assaults and abuse — The Sunday Times, The Times, Hardcash Productions and Channel 4 Dispatches

Huw Edwards Huw Edwards charged with making 37 indecent images of children, ‘shared on WhatsApp’ — The Sun

Naked photos sent in WhatsApp ‘phishing’ attacks on UK MPs and staff— Politico

No 10 pass for Labour donor who gave £500,000 — The Sunday Times

Labour will add 20% VAT to private school fees within first year of winning power — i

The Nottingham Attacks: A Search for Answers — BBC Panorama

Innovation

Harry Lewis-Irlam, Stephen Matthews, Darren Boyle, Rhodri Morgan — Mail Online: Deep Dive

• Anatomy of a loveless landslide: How Labour won on apathy and division
• Hour by hour, how D-Day unfolded…
• How China could seize Taiwan and spark WW3

Laura Dunn, Katie Lilley-Harris, Ellie Senior, Sherree Younger, Scott Nicholson, Jamie Mckerrow Maxwell — KL Magazine

• Rocky Bottoms
• Johnny Cave’s Asparagus
• Archangel Distilleries

Niels de Hoog, Antonio Voce, Elena Morresi, Manisha Ganguly, Ashley Kirk — The Guardian

• How war destroyed Gaza’s neighbourhoods – visual investigation

Alison Killing, Chris Miller, Peter Andringa, Chris Campbell, Sam Learner, Sam Joiner — Financial Times

• FT investigation finds Ukrainian children on Russian adoption sites

David Dubas-Fisher, Cullen Willis, Paul Gallagher, Richard Ault — Reach Data Unit

• DWP Cold Weather Payment postcode checker – map shows where households are due £25, £50 or £75 boost
• Enter postcodes in this map to see average house prices in your area
• Cheapest places in Greater Manchester to buy petrol as RAC issues fuel price warning

Gabriel Pogrund, Emanuele Midolo, Venetia Menzies, Darren Burchett, Narottam Medhora, Cecilia Tombesi — The Sunday Times

• The dead teenager, the lying suspect and the black box that proves it

The post British Journalism Awards 2024: Full list of this year’s finalists appeared first on Press Gazette.

Sunday Mail political editor John Ferguson said it was “always nice to get vindicated” after the SNP dismissed his revelations about the party’s membership and finance crisis last year as “drivel”.

Ferguson was recognised for his work, which likely led at least in part to the resignations of SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, chief executive Peter Murrell and head of communications Murray Foote, when he won the politics prize at the British Journalism Awards in December.

Ferguson told Press Gazette the SNP’s “default reaction was just to say that’s not true and brief against the story” – a theme he spotted when reporting other stories about the party as well.

However, he and the Sunday Mail team were “confident that we were right and it’s always nice to get vindicated, ultimately”.

As a result the “best lesson” he learned from reporting on this story was “if people are telling you that you’re wrong, it’s often going to be because you’re right – so don’t give up and don’t listen to people telling you that you’re wrong”.

How the SNP’s ‘house of cards’ began to fall

Ferguson’s work on the SNP finances crisis goes back to 2021 when he revealed police were investigating claims of a £600,000 fraud – a story that contributed to him being named a finalist for the Anti-Corruption Journalism category at the British Journalism Awards in 2021.

He said there were “furious denials from the party and claims this was all politically motivated but we looked into it a bit more and there had been a number of resignations from the SNP’s finance committee over a lack of transparency so it seemed that there was enough there to do the story.

“Whether there was a political element to it or not, the fact was it was now a police matter that was getting taken seriously”.

Ferguson then continued building up contacts within the SNP and examining the party’s accounts and ultimately in February 2023 he revealed that up to 30,000 people were believed to have cancelled their membership. “It’s all in a way linked to the finance because the SNP relies very much on its members to function,” he explained.

The party was “really furious” about the story, Ferguson said, with Foote labelling it “drivel” on Twitter and a party spokesperson condemning it as “both malicious and wholly inaccurate” in a story in pro-independence newspaper The National.

Sturgeon announced her intention to resign as first minister just days later, although her exact reasons remain unclear. Ferguson said there was “folklore” about whether she “had an inkling” about the upcoming police investigation or it was because the Sunday Mail had been given false information.

“But we went with that story and then like all of these things it was the cover-up that ended up being a bigger story than the original story in a way,” Ferguson said.

Within weeks the story had been proved “completely true”, Ferguson said, triggering the resignation of Foote as well as Murrell, who is also Sturgeon’s husband.

“I think that was when the whole house of cards began to fall a bit.”

Foote, who subsequently argued he had acted in “good faith” in his denials of the story and blamed the information he was given, has since been named Murrell’s successor as SNP CEO. He is a former editor of the Daily Record between 2014 and 2018, under whom Ferguson worked at that newspaper before he joined the Sunday Mail.

Ferguson kept on the story last spring, with his other award-winning stories including the revelation that senior SNP members were questioned by police about fraud allegations days before Sturgeon’s resignation, and a deep-dive into the “catalogue of lies” that led to Murrell’s resignation.

He also secured leaked video footage of Sturgeon insisting the SNP’s finances had “never been stronger” and warning officials to be “very careful” about suggesting there were “any problems” with the accounts.

Ferguson told Press Gazette the SNP’s response to his stories fit into a wider “erosion in standards in public life”.

“I think that’s why doing this sort of journalism’s really important,” he said.

“I think that politicians and public officials and business people in the main are quite decent and clever individuals to different degrees, but you can never underestimate and never cease to be amazed by the things that people do from corruption to dishonesty, and just downright stupidity when power and money and party politics are involved. And good public interest investigative journalism like the kind that these awards celebrate are the best bulwark really that we’ve got against all of that kind of thing.”

Sunday newspapers especially continue to hold a space for this kind of journalism, Ferguson said, as he called for them to stay a “distinct” entity. In recent years many major newsrooms, such as at the Mail, Mirror and The Times in Scotland, have either become seven-day operations or increased the level of collaboration between their daily and Sunday titles.

Ferguson said: “There’s lots of good journalism out there but Sunday newspapers are that space where you get a week to work in things where there’s traditionally a bit more of an appetite to take on challenging stories… It’s not easy doing good stories. It takes time and you need to deal with a lot of challenges and Sunday papers are the place where you can still get to do that.

“[If you look at] the amount of fantastic work that Sunday newspapers continue to do, I think it’s really important to keep them as a distinct thing and protect them as a little ecosystem and vehicle for really good investigative journalism.”

Ferguson shared praise for British Journalism Awards Journalist of the Year Gabriel Pogrund of The Sunday Times and Investigation of the Year winner Dan Neidle, who uses his experience as a tax lawyer to expose wrongdoing.

“It’s really important stuff that would almost certainly not come to light if it wasn’t for journalists spending a lot of time just digging into these issues and finding out what’s really happening,” Ferguson said. “So it does feel like there is this sort of erosion in standards in public life where if we didn’t have that, things would be a lot worse.”

‘More balance’ in Scottish newspapers and Sunday Mail ‘not biased’ against SNP

Despite the Sunday Mail going hard on the SNP, Ferguson said the newspaper is not biased against them.

“There’s always accusations that we’ve got some sort of bias at the Sunday Mail against the SNP and the truth is we’ve had the leaders of all the political parties in Scotland on the front page for various things and various negative stories over the last few years,” he said.

“It’s true the SNP have been there more often but the reality is they’ve been in power in Scotland now for 17 years and our job’s to hold power to account and it’s just a natural result of being in power as long as they have that they are going to be the focus of a lot of stories now.”

Ferguson said he believes there is “probably a bit more balance in the Scottish newspaper market” compared to how London-based titles report on politics.

He added: “Sometimes it feels like we give our politicians a rougher ride.” For example, speaking before Sturgeon’s appearance at the Covid inquiry last week, he pointed to the treatment of Scottish ministers over lost Covid Whatsapp messages who “seem to be getting a lot more stick in the press” compared to Rishi Sunak, whose messages also went missing.

“He doesn’t really appear to be getting held to the same standards by the London media, I’m not quite sure why that is.”

Several other Scottish journalists were winners at the British Journalism Awards in December: Andrew Picken of BBC Scotland News Online was recognised for his personal finance journalism while Rhiannon Davies of The Scottish Beacon won the Women in Journalism Georgina Henry Prize.

Ferguson said: “There are some really good journalists working in Scotland, breaking stories all the time that for understandable reasons don’t always cut through down in London the way that the SNP crisis has, but nonetheless there’s some really good stuff being done week in, week out.”

He added: “It’s really exciting to be involved in a story that captures attention down there. You always know you’ve done a good job when the BBC are leading on your story nationally, not just in the Scottish section of the site.”

The post How Sunday Mail journalist defied ‘furious’ denials to expose SNP financial scandal appeared first on Press Gazette.

The Guardian was the big winner of the British Journalism Awards 2023, taking home five prizes including News Provider of the Year.

BBC News won four awards, while ITV Exposure won three and The Times, The Sunday Times and The Economist’s 1843 Magazine all took home two apiece.

“Prolific scoop-getter” Gabriel Pogrund, Whitehall editor at The Sunday Times, was recognised as the Journalist of the Year for work that ultimately helped lead to the resignation of BBC chairman Richard Sharp and chief whip Gavin Williamson.

Freelance journalist Ian Birrell was recognised for Public Service Journalism for his work for the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday and the i due to his “incomparable” ability to bring public interest investigations to a mass audience.

The 12th annual British Journalism Awards continue to celebrate journalism that shows skill and rigour, is revelatory and serves the public interest.

The 30 winners were whittled down from 800 entries and 180 finalists by an independent panel of 80 judges.

Hi-res photos of the awards night are available to download via this link.

Scroll down for the full list of British Journalism Awards 2023 winners and highly commended finalists

Other winners included ITV’s Tom Bradby as Interviewer of the Year for his sitdown with Prince Harry, The Times for Scoop of the Year with its exposure of British Gas debt agents breaking into the homes of vulnerable people, and The Times again for its Clean it Up campaigning work for Campaign of the Year.

Reach won Innovation of the Year for its work using WhatsApp Communities, The Independent’s Bel Trew won the Marie Colvin Award for her work from Ukraine and Antonia Cundy was named New Journalist of the Year for her investigative work at the Financial Times.

The winners were revealed at a sold-out awards ceremony hosted by comedian Kerry Godliman at London’s Hilton Bankside on Thursday night (14 December).

In his opening comments, Press Gazette editor-in-chief and chairman of the judges Dominic Ponsford said: “Our business is important because it is the one which holds all others to account.

“Squeezed as we are by the dark forces of online advertising technology, under attack by litigious oligarchs and in more danger than ever when reporting on conflicts overseas – tonight is a night to forget all that and celebrate a job well done.”

The awards were supported by headline sponsor Starling Bank along with Amazon, Camelot, Google News Initiative, RenewableUK and YouTube. They supported charity partner the Journalists’ Charity.

The Journalists’ Charity is devoted to assisting members of the profession who fall on hard times. If you can, please help a colleague by making a donation via this link.

Full list of British Journalism Awards 2023 winners and highly commended finalists

Social Affairs, Diversity & Inclusion Journalism

WINNER: Ahmed Shihab-Eldin, Vanessa Bowles, Bettina Waked, Jasmine Bonshor, Liza Hodgson, Maria Caramelo, Mohamed Salah, Tim Awford, Rosie Garthwaite and Mustafa Khalili – BBC News

• Queer Egypt Under Attack

The judges said: “This was a really important piece of journalism with great bravery required by both reporters and sources.”

Highly commended: Maya Wolfe-Robinson, Joseph Harker, Jonathan Shainin, David Olusoga, Gary Younge, Lanre Bakare, Aamna Mohdin, Courtney Yusuf and others – The Guardian

• Cotton Capital

The judges said: “Few publications would be brave enough to subject themselves to such scrutiny.”

Features Journalism  

WINNER: Mick Brown – The Telegraph

• Inside the private world of Freddie Mercury, with the woman who knew him best
• Phil Spector told me he had ‘devils inside’. One month later, he murdered Lana Clarkson
• The strange case of the British rugby player who disappeared without a trace

The judges said: “This work was shocking, insightful and full of fascinating details. It showed true journalistic skills in breaking down the reluctance of people to talk.”

Highly commended: Ian Birrell – Daily Mail/Mail on Sunday

• I’ve seen the fragility of our way of life, how precious is peace and the need for vigilance against tyranny: Over six gruelling months, IAN BIRRELL has reported on the worst of humanity and also the best – in the courage and heroism of ordinary Ukrainians
• Town of the damned: Few places in Ukraine have suffered more than Izyum, where citizens say they now ‘live in caves’. At least 1,000 have died… and, as IAN BIRRELL found, one brave surgeon worked in medieval conditions to save who he could
• The mothers having their names erased from their children’s birth certificates – by the state

Highly commended: Simon Hattenstone – The Guardian

• My mother, the troll: ‘I think she lost sight of the McCanns’ humanity’
• ‘The crowd were saying, “Kill him, kick him to death”’: what happened to the people who protested against King Charles?
• The man who walked around the world: Tom Turcich on his seven-year search for the meaning of life

The judges praised Birrell’s “exemplary feature writing” and Hattenstone’s “fine writing”.

Local Journalism  

WINNER: Chris Burn – The Yorkshire Post

• My seven years reporting on Sheffield’s tree scandal
• How campaigners saved 11,000 Sheffield trees from the axe after council tried to jail them
• Sheffield Council misled public and courts over efforts to chop down half of city’s street trees, inquiry finds

The judges said: “The sheer scale of this story is extraordinary. This reporter showed huge tenacity to lift a veil of misinformation, misrepresentation and downright dishonesty.”

Highly commended: Sam McBride – Belfast Telegraph

• Crime scene documents show police were using illegal dump
• PSNI anti-corruption officers accused of corruption over £120 breakfasts, mysterious hotel stays and wine
• PSNI data slipped past FIVE key checks

The judges said McBride’s work showed “defiance of authority and sheer courage”.

Highly commended: Liam Thorp – Liverpool Echo

• Councillors used ‘back door’ to beat parking fines

The judges said Thorp successfully “lifted the lid on a shamefully warped culture in a local authority”.

Health & Life Sciences Journalism

WINNER: Mark Hedgecoe, James Rogan, Simon Gilchrist, Lesley Shields, Xinlan Rose and John Moffat – ITV Exposure

• The Clinic

The judges said: “This was journalism which got to the heart of a huge current topic, cutting through the noise and making a difference.”

Crime & Legal Journalism    

WINNER: Emily Dugan – The Guardian

• ‘I started shaking’: Andrew Malkinson on being told he is a free man
• Police and CPS had key DNA evidence 16 years before Andrew Malkinson cleared of rape
• Case review chief was in Montenegro during Andrew Malkinson revelations

The judges said: “This was exemplary campaigning work taking place over a number of years and revealing an appalling miscarriage of justice. The story came to represent the failure of the law enforcement, oversight and judicial systems.”

Comment Journalism  

WINNER: Matthew Holehouse – The Economist

• The Conservative Party faces a mutiny in Metroland
• The Conservative Party’s morbid symptoms
• Thatcher, Sunak and the politics of the supermarket

The judges said: “This writer has provided unrivalled and influential coverage of the undercurrents driving the Conservative Party’s languishing poll ratings.”

Highly commended: William Hague – The Times

• Boris Johnson and Liz Truss should fess up to failure
• Stop smartphones stealing kids’ childhoods
• HS2 has gone from shambles to red alert

The judges praised Hague’s “incisive writing and original thinking which often impacts public debate”.

Specialist Journalism

WINNER: Peter Blackburn and Ben Ireland – The Doctor magazine/British Medical Association

• A tale of one city
• Further than ever
• Symptoms of a crisis

The judges said: “These were meaty investigations with a great blend of data and powerful personal stories. They pull few punches but always keep focus on sustaining a strong narrative.”

Highly commended: Samantha Booth – Schools Week

• The Great SEND School Robbery
• ‘Disturbing neglect’ as severely disabled children left to go hungry
• How inclusive are mainstream schools?

The judges praised Booth for “huge investigative effort on a topic which rarely features in national headlines”.

Foreign Affairs Journalism  

WINNER: Handa Majed, Ben Ferguson, Nechirvan Mando, Jamie Welham and David Modell – ITV Exposure

• The Crossing

The judges said: “This was an absolutely immaculate piece of filmmaking providing forensic reconstruction of a historic maritime disaster with powerful testimony from the family of the victims.”

Technology Journalism, sponsored by Amazon 

WINNER: Siân Boyle – The Sunday Times/Daily Mail

• Televisions, smart meters, fridges, doorbells… and even light bulbs: The very real fears Beijing has filled Britain’s homes with gadgets that China can use to spy on us
• Why China doesn’t let its kids loose on TikTok
• Is Big Brother Britain about to become the world’s ultimate surveillance state?

The judges said: “This is a journalist who is ahead of the pack in terms of bringing the big technology themes to a mainstream audience and is completely on top of her brief.”

Built Environment Journalism  

WINNER: Jessica Hill – Schools Week

• The ‘ticking time bomb’ leaving schools ‘liable to collapse’
• Councils dawdle on surveying collapse risk building material
• UK public buildings feared to be at risk of collapse as concrete crumbles

The judges said of the winner: “A fantastic piece of journalism and a reminder that sector specialist magazines can and should scoop the national media. Jessica highlighted the problem of aerated concrete in schools with a story that became at national obsession nine months later.”

Personal Finance Journalism 

WINNER: Andrew Picken – BBC Scotland News Online

• Tenant urges others to follow after deposit win
• Paramedics say people are getting ill because their homes are so cold
• Parents’ anguish as Dargavel school 1,000 places short after £75m blunder

The judges said Picken had “gone the extra yard with his reporting and provided a voice for people who are often overlooked by the media”.

Highly commended: Katie Morley – The Telegraph

• ‘My partner was scammed out of £500,000, but is he hiding a deep dark secret?’
• Surprising new twist for autistic scam victim who lost £500,000
• ‘I lost £400k after a NatWest wealth adviser referred me to a Ponzi scheme’

The judges described Morley as an “excellent example of a consumer champion”.

Energy & Environment Journalism, sponsored by RenewableUK

WINNER: Jess Kelly, Owen Pinnell, Carole Bertinet, Mohamed Boteen, Nour Altounji, Inam Talib, Azhar Al-Rubaie, Rosie Garthwaite, Mustafa Khalili and Tim Awford – BBC News

• Under Poisoned Skies

The judges said: “This was prescient, influential and thorough. It had the wow factor and was investigative journalism which got results.”

Highly commended: Elisângela Mendonça, Andrew Wasley, Misbah Khan, Grace Murray and Josephine Moulds – The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

• Collagen craze drives deforestation and rights abuses
• Polish meat giant supplied superbug-infected chicken to UK shelves
• Mines, pipelines and oil rigs: what HSBC’s ‘sustainable finance’ really pays for

The judges said this was “impactful public interest journalism where the reporters got their hands dirty”.

Highly commended: Rachel Salvidge and Leana Hosea – The Guardian/Watershed Investigations

• Revealed: scale of ‘forever chemical’ pollution across UK and Europe
• Buncefield: the PFAS legacy of ‘biggest fire in peacetime Europe’
• Firm releases almost 800kg of ‘forever chemical’ a year into Lancashire river

The judges said this was “important journalism which involved vital original scientific research”.

Arts & Entertainment Journalism  

WINNER: Rachael Healy – The Guardian

• David Walliams recorded making derogatory remarks about BGT contestants
• ‘We’ve had to stop people fighting and urinating in their seats’: the ugly new side of theatre audiences
• Was it worth it? Edinburgh fringe acts give their verdict on the festival

The judges said: “A big talking point at the time and well executed. This was the definition of a good story, something a powerful person does not want in a newspaper.”

Highly commended: Ashleigh Rainbird – Daily Mirror

• David Jason exclusive: The daughter I didn’t know I had
• David Jason’s daughter shock: I’m tickled pink that he’s my dad
• David Jason’s wife: It’s lovely to embrace David’s daughter into our family

The judges said this was a “strong news story, well written and sensitively landed”.

New Journalist of the Year 

WINNER: Antonia Cundy – Financial Times

• Oxford university stuck with Sacklers as opioid deaths led others to cut ties
• How Crispin Odey evaded sexual assault allegations for decades
• The fishermen

The judges said Cundy’s work was “powerful journalism, exposing unseen truths” and praised her for taking on “the rich and powerful with fearless reporting”.

Marie Colvin Award

WINNER: Bel Trew – The Independent

The judges said: “Marie would have admired Bel’s self-starting courage. Bel is a journalist who has become one of the leading foreign correspondents in the world in recent years. She began her career as a freelance covering the Arab Spring, based in Egypt until she was detained and expelled by the Egyptian authorities for her reporting.

“We particularly admired her steadfast reporting from Ukraine and her excellent feature documentary on the country’s missing war dead put together without the budget of big broadcasters.”

Sports Journalism

WINNER: William Ralston – The Guardian

• The impossible job: inside the world of Premier League referees

The judges said Ralston’s winning work was “wonderful, professional and in-depth reporting of an issue that is growing in massive significance but has previously been given superficial coverage”.

Highly commended: David Walsh – The Sunday Times

• Why Gareth Southgate has chosen to stay as England manager
• How dementia stole my rugby star husband Fergus Slattery
• Caster Semenya: It is right to insist runner suppresses hormones

The judges said Walsh “consistently covers difficult issues in a sensitive and professional manner, always making his readers think – year after year”.

Campaign of the Year 

WINNER: Clean It Up – The Times

The judges said: “Excellent use of data and strong graphics backed up a strongly organised campaign which has made clear progress on tackling a long-standing UK environmental problem.”

Highly commended: The Bruno and Dom project – The Guardian

The judges said: “This was a mighty reporting effort in a noble cause, to ensure that killing a journalist did not kill the story of criminal environmental destruction they uncovered.”

Photojournalism

WINNER: Christopher Occhicone – 1843 Magazine, The Economist

The judges said: “These were challenging images documenting the human cost of conflict, captured with subtlety, empathy and honesty.”

Highly commended: Victoria Jones – Press Association

The judges praised Jones’s portfolio of “impactful, elegant historic images”.

Interviewer of the Year

WINNER: Tom Bradby – ITV1

• Harry – The Interview

The judges said: “This was a scoop interview that has stood the test of time – and will continue to do so for, probably, years to come. Executed under tight deadlines with no editorial control and great professionalism despite the interviewer’s closeness to the subject. This interview made headlines around the world.”

[Read more: Interviewer of the year Tom Bradby: Harry ‘never asked me what questions I was going to ask’]

Politics Journalism

WINNER: John Ferguson – Sunday Mail

• Sturgeon crisis as 30,000 quit SNP
• Fraud cops quiz SNP chiefs
• SNP in crisis: Sex, lies and spin

The judges said: “This was a huge piece of investigative journalism which has made a huge difference to the whole leadership of the SNP and so to Scotland itself and will likely have ramifications for the next Westminster general election.”

Highly commended: Steven Swinford – The Times

• Kwasi Kwarteng flew back to UK not knowing he was out
• Boris Johnson deliberately misled parliament on partygate, MPs find
• Tougher transgender guidance for schools is unlawful, Sunak told

The judges praised Swinford’s “great breadth of stories including one real toast-dropper”.

Business, Finance and Economics Journalism, sponsored by Starling Bank

WINNER: Anna Isaac – The Guardian

• ‘I could barely speak. I felt like a ghost inside my own skin’: the month that shook the CBI
• Tesco chair accused of inappropriate behaviour by four women
• Nadhim Zahawi ‘agreed on penalty’ to settle tax bill worth millions

The judges said Isaac’s CBI investigation “was a real scoop which has had wide-ranging impact. It also required long, and very sensitive, research”.

Highly commended: Gordon Rayner – Telegraph Media Group

• Coutts closed Nigel Farage’s account because he didn’t ‘align with their values’
• Bank chief Dame Alison sat next to BBC journalist night before he tweeted claim about Nigel Farage
• Head of NatWest embroiled in Nigel Farage bank scandal

The judges said Rayner’s work featured “detailed reporting and fantastic presentation and helped lead to the boss of one of Britain’s biggest financial institutions resigning”.

Travel Journalism

WINNER: Sophie Pinkham – 1843 Magazine, The Economist

• Inside the European forest that geopolitics has turned into a graveyard

The judges said this was “brilliant investigative journalism with a kick in the solar plexus. It took headlines, soundbites and government propaganda around immigration and turned into a deeply human story that gets to the heart of the issue”.

Online Video Journalism, sponsored by YouTube

WINNER: Jean MacKenzie – BBC News

• Inside North Korea: ‘We are stuck, waiting to die’

The judges described MacKenzie’s work as “engaging, different and distinct, using a great use of online storytelling techniques to provide a voice for oppressed people in one of the most unreported parts of the world”.

Investigation of the Year

WINNER: Dan Neidle – Tax Policy Associates

• Nadhim Zahawi tax avoidance allegations

The judges said: “This was a determined and forensic investigation carried out in the face of continual legal intimidation.”

Highly commended: Ellie Flynn and Alice McShane – Channel 4/Kalel Productions

• Undercover: Sexual Harassment – The Truth

The judges described this as “culture shifting work which shed light on an important subject”.

Highly commended: Handa Majid, Ben Ferguson, Nechirvan Mando, Jamie Welham and David Modell – ITV Exposure

• The Crossing

The judges described this as “an immaculate piece of film-making which movingly gave a voice to some of the most forgotten and vulnerable people in the world”.

Scoop of the Year  

WINNER: Exposed: How British Gas Debt Agents Break into Homes of Vulnerable – The Times

The judges said: “This was the big scoop around one of the biggest stories of the year, the cost of living crisis. A big story that mattered to people and made a difference to the way things were done.”

Innovation of the Year, sponsored by Google News Initiative

WINNER: Dan Russell, Jenna Thompson and Rachel Gorman – Reach

• WhatsApp Communities

The judges said: “This was pioneering use of a tech platform, which is ubiquitous yet under-used by publishers, to deliver meaningful audience engagement.”

Highly commended: Sam Coates, Joe White, Katie Riley, Tom Larkin, Tom Rayner, Edward Clowes and David Mapstone – Sky News/Tortoise Media

• Westminster Accounts

The judges described this as a “brilliant way of displaying a complex story with huge public interest”.

News Provider of the Year

WINNER: The Guardian

The judges said: “This title has shone a light on under-reported parts of the world and campaigned for social justice and environmental change with its investigations this year. And it has even investigated difficult truths from its own past while delivering a mass audience and achieving financial sustainability.”

[Read more: Guardian to build on ‘direct link’ between supporters and journalism with global growth]

Public Service Journalism

WINNER: Ian Birrell – Daily Mail/Mail on Sunday/the i

The judges said Birrell has “managed to shine new light on the untold stories of victims of the Russian invasion of Ukraine with vivid reporting from the frontline of that conflict.

“He has also shown intellectual courage challenging orthodoxies around coverage of the Covid-19 pandemic and championed the rights of same-sex parents in Italy in the face of a far-right government crackdown.

“His range is incredible and his ability to bring public interest investigative journalism to a mass audience incomparable.”

Journalist of the Year

WINNER: Gabriel Pogrund – The Sunday Times

The judges said Pogrund is a “prolific scoop-getter whose reporting helped topple the chairman of the BBC after exposing murky financial details involving the prime minister.

“He also revealed the presence of a paid lobbyist as a close aide to short-lived UK premier Liz Truss and prompted the resignation of chief whip Gavin Williamson over bullying allegations.

“He has also shown his range with deep reporting on an untold tragedy at the heart of Britain’s secret intelligence community.”

[Read more: Investigative reporting is a ‘masochistic business’ says journalist of the year Gabriel Pogrund]

Women in Journalism Georgina Henry Award, sponsored by Wiggin

WINNER: Rhiannon Davies – The Scottish Beacon

The judges said: “At a time when local news publishers are under real pressure, The Scottish Beacon gives underserved communities a much-needed voice. It is a truly collaborative project that brings community-based outlets together to hold the powerful to account and to help strengthen democracy. Having already achieved an impressive amount in the short time it’s been running, we can’t wait to see what it brings next.”

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The editor of the Sunday Mail left the title last week as seven redundancies fell across the newspaper and sister Scottish title the Daily Record.

Brendan McGinty was appointed editor of the Mail and deputy editor of the Record in October 2016 when the editorial teams of the two Glasgow-based papers merged to create a seven-day operation.

McGinty had worked on the Sunday Mail since joining as a reporter in 2001, spending eight years as news editor and four as deputy editor.

He has been replaced as Mail editor by Lorna Hughes, the title’s first female editor in its 101-year history. It is believed she is the first female editor at any Scottish national newspaper for more than 20 years.

Reach, publisher of the Mirror, Express and Star titles, did not confirm which six other roles had been affected by the redundancies.

A spokesperson for the Daily Record and Sunday Mail said: “A number of redundancies were made last week at the Daily Record and Sunday Mail.

“We want to thank those members of staff for their work and wish them the very best for the future.”

The titles are the best-selling Scottish newspapers. The Sunday Mail had a circulation of 105,451 in January while the Daily Record had sales of 104,343 according to the latest ABC figures.

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Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has said she had no role in a legal bid aimed at preventing a newspaper from publishing a story about a prisoner’s death.

Allan Marshall was restrained by guards at HMP Edinburgh and suffered a cardiac arrest during a lengthy struggle with staff.

He was dragged face down and feet first by prison officers.

A sheriff later ruled his death in March 2015 was “entirely preventable”, saying there were “instances when better training of Scottish Prison Service staff could have made the difference”.

Lawyers went to court in the middle of the night last month in a bid to prevent details of the case being published.

The Sunday Mail wanted to publish CCTV images of the incident, but was summoned to court at 9.30pm on Saturday 24 August after the presses had started rolling.

According to the Mail’s sister website the Daily Record, lawyers for the Scottish Prosecution Service argued in court shortly after midnight that their guards’ privacy would be breached.

However the newspaper successfully argued that no one would be identifiable because the images had been pixelated, and the front page story was allowed to run.

The journalists agreed to hold off on publication of the CCTV footage for 72 hours while further legal discussions took place.

But the video was published on the Daily Record website after the prison service decided not to take any further legal action.

Denying any role in what happened, Sturgeon told Holyrood yesterday: “This was a decision by the Scottish Prison Service to initiate court action.

“The Scottish Prison Service later decided not to proceed with that action and I think that was the right decision.”

Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard, who challenged her on the case at First Minister’s Questions, accused her Government of “heavy-handed interference in the freedom of the press”.

He raised the issue as members of Marshall’s family looked on from Holyrood’s public gallery.

The Scottish Labour leader claimed ministers “went to court in the middle of the night seeking an interdict” to prevent the story from being published.

Leonard told the First Minister: “Let’s be clear, Allan Marhsall died following a shocking incident in prison service custody, the sheriff says his death was ‘entirely preventable’ and your Government goes to court in the dead of night to keep this out of the public eye.”

He then demanded: “Does the First Minister regret this heavy-handed interference in the freedom of the press, will she apologise to members of Allan Marshall’s family, who are in the public gallery of the Parliament today, and will the First Minister agree to a full independent investigation into her government’s actions, including how much money was wasted, the role of the Justice Secretary and indeed her own role in this?”

Sturgeon, who confirmed she had watched CCTV footage of Marshall being restrained, stressed she “had no role” in the legal proceedings.

She said any lessons that could be learned from the case would be, as she offered her condolences to the dead man’s family for their “grief and anguish”.

The First Minister said: “I take matters like this extremely seriously because I take very seriously the responsibilities of the state when individuals are in custody, their human rights continue to require to be protected and respected, so therefore in situations like this if there are lessons to be learned it is vital they are learned.”

The Scottish Prison Service is currently considering 13 recommendations made after a fatal accident inquiry into the death, with Sturgeon saying Holyrood committees could also probe what happened.

Picture: Andy Buchanan/Pool via Reuters

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Daily Record editor Murray Foote is to step down after four years.

Foote, who is also responsible for the Sunday Mail in his role as Media Scotland editor in chief (nationals), said the decision to leave the Trinity Mirror-owned title was “entirely mine”.

He added: “I will always have a great affection for the Record. It has been a part of my life for many years.

“And while being editor of this great Scottish institution has been a massive personal privilege, the greater privilege has been working alongside the best group of journalists in Scotland.”

During Foote’s editorship the Record was named Scottish Newspaper of the Year three times.

Media Scotland digital director David Dick will take over from Foote at the beginning of March.

Dick worked at the Evening Times in Glasgow and joined the Sunday Herald in 1999, going onto serve as is deputy editor.

He was appointed digital editor in 2015, launching the Glasgow Live website in 2016 and winning Digital Team of the Year awards for the Record at last years Scottish Press awards.

Dick said: “It is an incredible honour to be asked to lead the finest group of journalists in the country.

“There is no bigger job in the Scottish media and while the industry faces challenges we have an outstanding team which will ensure a bright future for our print and digital mastheads.

“My role in digital has been incredibly rewarding and we have enjoyed huge success over the past two and a half years. Long may that continue.

“Following Murray Foote as the editor-in-chief of the print titles is no small task and I know that we, as a team, can build on his success.”

Picture: Trinity Mirror

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A man who threw acid in the face of a journalist on the doorstep of his home has been jailed for ten years.

William Burns posed as a postman before throwing sulphuric acid at Russell Findlay at his home in Glasgow in December 2015.

Sentencing Burns at the High Court in Aberdeen on Tuesday, Judge Lord Matthews said the 56-year-old had apparently carried out the “vicious, premeditated attack” due to objecting “to something that your victim wrote”.

Findlay, who was investigations editor of the Scottish Sun at the time, overpowered Burns with the help of neighbours.

Burns, from Paisley, Renfrewshire, denied the attack but was found guilty of assault to severe injury and danger of life following a trial at the High Court in Glasgow.

He was sentenced to ten years in jail with five years on licence following release.

Matthews told him he was “clearly a dangerous man”.

He said: “You have been convicted of a vicious, premeditated attack by the throwing of sulphuric acid into the face of a journalist on the threshold of his own home two days before Christmas.

“You were caught virtually red-handed and your own evidence was an obvious fabrication from start to finish, plainly being made up as you were going along.

“Leaving aside your own explanation why you were there, the only reason I can discern for your actions is that you objected to something that your victim wrote.

“There are ways and means of dealing with grievances, real or imagined, against the media and this was plainly not one of them.

“The freedom of the press is an essential tool in the armoury of any democracy and attacks of this nature will not be tolerated.”

His sentencing statement, later released by the Judiciary of Scotland, continued: “To some extent, you bit off more than you could chew. Mr Findlay did not take your attack lying down.

“He was able to overpower you and with the prompt assistance of neighbours you were detained there and then.

“Due to the intervention of those neighbours, Mr Findlay’s injuries were not as bad as they might have been.

“It is or should be well-known that acid has the potential to cause catastrophic damage and it is no thanks to you that that was not the case here.”

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Journalists at the Daily Record and Sunday Mail have announced their intention to ballot for industrial action after publisher Trinity Mirror announced plans to merge the two titles.

News and feature departments will be combined as part of the merger, announced last month, with 15 jobs at risk of redundancy on the Record and Mail, Scotland’s best-selling Sunday title.

A further seven jobs will also be lost at Trinity Mirror’s Glasgow based local newspaper titles.

The ballot is to be held by members of the National Union of Journalists.

The merger comes as Trinity Mirror looks to establish a “seven-day” news operation following growth in digital, evens and its business division.

A spokesperson for the publisher said: “We can confirm we have received notification from the NUJ of an intention to ballot members of the Daily Record and Sunday Mail chapel over industrial action. We continue to consult with staff.”

The Sunday Mail sells an average of 183,532 copies a week while the Record sells 168,999 daily copies, the latest ABC figures show.

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One of Scotland’s longest-serving editors is taking voluntary redundancy.

Jim Wilson, who has edited the Sunday Mail for seven years, will leave at the end of the month.

He has worked at the Mail, Scotland’s best-selling Sunday newspaper (178,595 copies – ABC), since 2000.

Wilson, who is also chairman of the Scottish Newspaper Society’s editors’ committee, said: “I have been very lucky to work with so many great journalists on such a great newspaper.”

The Trinity-owned title has been commended for its campaigning journalism under Wilson’s editorship and has won a number of awards.

It was named Scottish Newspaper of the Year in 2014, with judges hailing the paper’s “outstanding investigations, strong human interest and serious content”.

Last year, after the Mail revealed a forgotten suspect for the murder of Emma Caldwell in 2005, Police Scotland mounted an illegal operation to find their sources.

The Crown Office ordered the reopening of the murder investigation weeks after the Mail’s reports. The inquiry is ongoing, as is an independent inquiry into the force’s molehunt.

In May, Wilson told Press Gazette: “The protection of sources is fundamental to a free press but, most importantly, the police should have been more concerned with the content of our stories than the sources.

“After all these years Emma Caldwell and her family still deserve justice. They should have been the priority for the police not us.”

A Trinity Mirror spokesperson said: “We can confirm Jim is stepping down as Editor of the Sunday Mail, with effect from 4 September.

“Jim’s fearless, campaigning journalism saw the Mail win Newspaper of the Year in 2014. We wish him every success in his future career.”

Wilson, who worked at a number of newspapers including the Scotsman and Daily Record before joining the Mail, is understood to be considering a number of options, including a move into public affairs.

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