Former Washington Post and Associated Press executive editor Sally Buzbee will join Reuters next month as its news editor for the US and Canada.

Reporting to global managing editor for politics, economics and world news Mark Bendeich, Buzbee will oversee all Reuters text and visual journalists in North America, although financial journalists will continue reporting into global managing editor of business news Tiffany Wu.

Reuters said Buzbee was “one of the world’s most distinguished editors”.

“During her three years at The Post, Sally expanded the Post’s international investigations work, oversaw the creation of new consumer-facing election-night features and built out coverage of wellness and climate. She oversaw coverage that won several Pulitzer Prizes, including the 2022 public service award for an examination of the Jan 6 insurrection at the US Capitol and the 2024 national reporting prize for a visually told investigation of the AR-15’s role in US mass slayings.”

Buzbee said she was “honoured to join Reuters, an organization renowned for its commitment to journalistic excellence. I look forward to working with the talented team to deliver compelling and impactful stories and scoops to our clients, readers, and viewers”.

Reuters editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni commented: “I have admired Sally for years, and I am so excited that she will be joining the Reuters family in this key role.

“Her journalistic chops, her management experience, her global understanding, and her positive and pragmatic approach are just what we need in this time of upheaval for the world and for the news industry.”

Buzbee starts in her new role on 11 December. She succeeds Kieran Murray who Reuters said “is moving on to a new role focused on planning, creating and executing newsroom conferences and other events at Reuters”.

Buzbee stepped down as top editor at the Post in June, prompting an ultimately abortive attempt by proprietor Jeff Bezos and chief executive Will Lewis to install Telegraph deputy editor Robert Winnett as her successor.

The post Former Washington Post executive editor Sally Buzbee joins Reuters as news editor 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.

Reuters and CNN have both announced on the same day that they will introduce a metered paywall on their websites.

Both news outlets are rolling out a digital subscription model that will see users able to read an as-yet undisclosed number of articles per month before being asked to subscribe.

CNN, currently the biggest news website in the US by visits and the third most popular in the world, said it will charge its most-regular users in the US $3.99 (£3) per month to access the full site.

The subscription will include exclusive features and documentaries, a daily curation of content, and fewer online adverts.

According to the outlet, some content will remain fully accessible including the homepage, breaking news live stories, standalone video pages and sponsored articles.

Meanwhile Reuters, currently the 30th biggest news website in the world, said full access globally to its website and newly relaunched app will cost $1 (75p) per week, or $4 per month.

Reuters president Paul Bascobert said: “This new subscription plan ensures Reuters can expand the reach of its award-winning coverage at an affordable price, while allowing us to further invest in our reporting and products for subscribers.”

Reuters will begin rolling out the digital subscription in Canada in early October before it goes to multiple countries in Europe and the US and, ultimately, all around the world.

Reuters promised that the pricing plan is “simple and transparent” with “no introductory offers or surprise price increases” and said users can “easily cancel”.

Reuters first publicly mooted the addition of an online paywall for its website in 2021 but the idea was ditched due to a dispute with financial data provider Refinitiv, a former Thomson Reuters division acquired by LSEG in 2021, over whether introducing subscriptions would breach their news supply agreement.

Reuters then raised the idea again in January 2023 after agreeing with LSEG a “path forward for Reuters to launch consumer-facing subscription products supporting both parties’ engagement with global professionals”.

Reuters owner Thomson Reuters said in August it expected to grow revenues by about 7% in 2024. The Reuters News division saw revenues grow by 13% in the first six months of the year to $415m. In Q2 its growth was put down to “growth in the agency business and by a contractual price increase from our news agreement with the data and analytics business of LSEG”.

Meanwhile at CNN revenues are challenged by its reliance on linear TV, in particular carriage fees from the cable industry.

Chief executive Mark Thompson, who joined last year and previously led the launch of the successful digital subscriptions strategy at The New York Times, said this summer that he intended to “future-proof” CNN, including by building a digital subscriptions business bringing in more than a billion dollars in revenue.

Alex MacCallum, CNN’s executive vice president of digital products and services, told staff in a memo on Tuesday that the initial offering will be expanded with “new products and businesses” to come.

“Over time, we will invest in ways to better meet our users’ needs and expand our aperture to engage and serve new audiences,” she said.

CNN’s previous attempt at a subscription-based business, its subscription service CNN+, closed after one month in April 2022. It was reported to have reached 150,000 paying subscribers.

The post Reuters and CNN launch paywalls on same day appeared first on Press Gazette.

A British security adviser for Reuters has been killed in an airstrike in Ukraine on Saturday 24 August 2024.

Two journalists for Reuters were also injured, one seriously, in the strike.

A missile struck the Hotel Sapphire where a six-person Reuters team was staying in the city of Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine, the news agency said. The area is in Ukrainian control but near the frontline of fighting with Russia.

Ryan Evans, a 38-year-old Army veteran from Wrexham in Wales, had four children, the youngest of which was 18 months old. His wife described him as a “gentle giant”.

Evans had been working for Reuters since 2022 including on other Ukraine reporting trips, in Israel close to the border with Gaza, and during the Paris Olympics.

Reuters said in a statement it was “devastated” by the loss.

“We are urgently seeking more information about the attack, including by working with the authorities in Kramatorsk, and we are supporting our colleagues and their families. We send our deepest condolences and thoughts to Ryan’s family and loved ones.

“Ryan has helped keep so many of our journalists safe as they covered events around the world. He was a dear colleague and friend, and we will miss him terribly.”

Reuters said on Monday that its Ukrainian video journalist Ivan Lyubysh-Kirdey, 40, remained in a critical condition after the attack.

Ukraine correspondent Daniel Peleschuk, an American journalist for Reuters who was also injured, has been discharged from hospital.

The three other Reuters members of staff present at the hotel for the attack are safe and accounted for.

In a conference call with reporters a Kremlin spokesperson did not address whether the hotel was targeted but said Moscow only struck military infrastructure or places “related to military infrastructure in one way or another”, Reuters reported.

British Foreign Secretary David Lammy said he was “deeply saddened” by the death of Evans while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky  said of the attack: “A regular city hotel was destroyed by a Russian Iskander missile. Absolutely purposefully, in a thought-out way.”

Jeanne Cavelier, head of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk at Reporters Without Borders (Reporters Sans Frontieres), said: “RSF condemns the death of Reuters security advisor Ryan Evans and is concerned about the health of his two journalist colleagues – one of whom is in a serious condition – who were injured by the same Russian missile strike. Our thoughts are with the victims and their families.

“At this stage, we do not know whether the hotel was targeted because of the presence of the media. One thing is certain: since the beginning of the war, the Russian army has been deliberately attacking journalists and their crews to prevent them from reporting, in violation of international law. RSF is calling for a thorough investigation to identify and prosecute those responsible.”

Scroll down or click here for coverage of other journalists killed or injured in Ukraine since 24 February 2022:

• AFP journalist Arman Soldin killed
• La Repubblica fixer Bohdan Bitik
• Reuters journalists injured and driver killed
• Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff
• Vira Hyrych
• Mantas Kvedaravicius
• Ukrainian photojournalist Maks Levin
• Oksana Baulina
• Fox News cameraman killed and presenter seriously injured
• Brent Renaud
• Oleg Baturin kidnapped
• Guillaume Briquet was wounded and hospitalised
• Alaraby TV journalists under fire
• Ukrainian news cameraman Yevhenii Sakun
• Sky’s Stuart Ramsay wounded in ambush
• Danish journalists shot

Journalists attacked in Ukraine:

10/5/23: AFP journalist Arman Soldin has been killed by a rocket strike in eastern Ukraine, the news agency announced on Tuesday night (9 May 2023).

Soldin was reporting with four AFP colleagues from the town of Chasiv Yar, close to Bakhmut – the epicentre of fighting in eastern Ukraine for several months. The rest of the team were unhurt.

The 32-year-old was part of the first AFP team to be posted in Ukraine when the war began, and he was later appointed Ukraine video coordinator based in Kyiv in September, a role that included leading coverage and travelling to frontlines himself.

AFP chairman Fabrice Fries said: “The whole agency is devastated by the loss of Arman. His death is a terrible reminder of the risks and dangers faced by journalists every day covering the conflict in Ukraine.”

AFP’s Europe director Christine Buhagiar described him as ‘‘enthusiastic, energetic and brave’’, adding: ‘‘He was a real on-the-ground reporter, always ready to work even in the most difficult places. He was totally devoted to his craft.’’

Soldin is believed to be at least the tenth journalist killed reporting on the war in Ukraine, one of more than 12,000 accredited journalists who have covered the conflict.

26/4/23: Two journalists working for the Italian newspaper La Repubblica came under fire on 26 while reporting near the Antonivskiy Bridge on the outskirts of Kherson, in southern Ukraine – the IFJ reports. A Ukrainian journalist working as a fixer, Bohdan Bitik, was shot dead and his Italian colleague, Corrado Zunino, was wounded in the shoulder.

22/6/22: Reporters Without Borders has concluded that photojournalist Maks Levin was likely executed by Russian troops.

The press freedom group reports that Levin entered a Russian-occupied forest near Kyiv to retrieve his drone when he was killed on 13 March.

It found the place where he died and reports: “Levin’s charred Ford Maverick was still there. RSF found several bullets at the scene, along with the identity papers of Chernyshov, the soldier who was with Levin, and identified 14 bullet impacts in his car. Several items with possible DNA traces attesting to the presence of Russian soldiers very close to the spot where Levin and Chernyshov were killed were also identified by RSF and some of them were taken. In a final search phase initiated by RSF, metal detectors located a bullet that had probably struck Levin.”

6/6/2022:

Two Reuters journalists have been injured, and their driver killed, as their vehicle came under fire from Russian forces as they travelled towards the eastern Ukrainian city of Sievierodonetsk.

The news agency reported that its photographer Alexander Ermochenko and cameraman Pavel Klimov respectively sustained a small shrapnel wound and an arm fracture and were treated in hospital.

Reuters said it did not immediately know the identity of the driver as he and the car they were in had been provided by Russian-backed separatists for the journalists’ reporting trip. The incident took place on a Russian-held part of the road.

31/5/22:

French journalist Frédéric Leclerc-Imhoff has been killed in eastern Ukraine while covering the civilian evacuation.

Leclerc-Imhoff, 32, was killed by shell shrapnel which pierced the armoured vehicle he was travelling in, according to the BBC. Earlier reports, prompted by a tweet by French president Emmanuel Macron and which were carried by Press Gazette, had said Leclerc-Imhoff had been shot on board a humanitarian bus.

Leclerc-Imhoff reported for French news channel BFMTV. According to Sky the regional governor of Luhansk wrote on Telegram that Leclerc-Imhoff suffered a “fatal wound to the neck” while “making material about the evacuation”.

The BBC reports Leclerc-Imhoff’s colleague Maxime Brandstaetter was also injured, but a Ukrainian journalist travelling with the pair was unharmed.

29/4/22:

Vira Hyrych, a Ukrainian journalist for international news service Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, was killed in a Russian missile attack on Kyiv on Thursday 28 April.

The Institute of Mass Information said a rocket had hit her apartment. Her death brings the journalist death toll to at least eight since the invasion of Ukraine began on 24 February.

Hyrych joined Radio Svoboda (Liberty) in February 2018 after working for Ukrainian TV channels. The outlet said: “The editorial staff of Radio Svoboda expresses its condolences to the family of Vira Girich and will remember her as a bright and kind person, a true professional.”

One of Hyrych’s colleagues, Mike Eckel, described her as “one of the nicest people in our bureau; patient, diligent, kind, and dedicated”.

7/4/22: Fox News correspondent Benjamin Hall has revealed the extent of his injuries for the first time, three weeks after an attack that killed two of his colleagues.

The British journalist, 39, said he felt “damn lucky” to have survived the shelling attack by Russian forces that killed cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski and producer Oleksandra Kuvshynova.

Hall wrote on Twitter: “It’s been over three weeks since the attack in Ukraine and I wanted to start sharing it all. But first I need to pay tribute to my colleagues Pierre and Sasha who didn’t make it that day.

“Pierre and I travelled the world together, working was his joy and his joy was infectious. RIP.”

Sharing a picture of himself bandaged and wearing an eye patch he added: “To sum it up, I’ve lost half a leg on one side and a foot on the other.

“One hand is being put together, one eye is no longer working, and my hearing is pretty blown… but all in all I feel pretty damn lucky to be here – and it is the people who got me here who are amazing.”

4/4/22: Lithuanian documentary filmmaker Mantas Kvedaravicius was killed by Russian forces while trying to leave Mariupol, according to Reuters in a report citing the Ukrainian Defence Ministry.

His death means seven journalists have been killed during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Kvedaravicius was shot “with a camera in his hands” according to a colleague in the besieged port city that has become one of the most violent centres of fighting in Ukraine.

Kvedaravicius was known for creating the 2016 conflict-zone documentary “Mariupolis”, which premiered at the 2016 Berlin International Film Festival and covered life in the city, as well as the 2011 film Barzakh.

The latter covered life in Chechnya, a region where the Russian military fought two brutal wars quashing rebellions during the 1990s and 2000s, and was awarded a prize at the Berlin International Film Festival by Amnesty International.

“We lost a creator well-known in Lithuania and in the whole world who, until the very last moment, in spite of the danger, worked in Russia-occupied Ukraine,” Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said.

“Mantas Kvedaravicius was murdered today [3 April] in Mariupol, with a camera in his hands, in this shitty war of evil, against the whole world,” added Russian film director Vitaly Mansky, founder of the Artdocfest festival which Kvedaravicius had participated in.

4/4/22: Maks Levin, a well-known Ukrainian photojournalist, has become the sixth journalist to be killed in Ukraine since the Russian invasion began.

Levin, who had worked with outlets including Reuters, the BBC and AP, had been missing since mid-March but his body was found in a village to the north of Kyiv on Friday (1 April).

The Ukrainian prosecutor’s office said in a statement that preliminary information indicated he had been killed “in two small arms fires” by Russian armed forces.

Levin, who was married with four young sons, was reportedly travelling with a serviceman and ex-photographer whose condition is still unknown.

Levin worked with the Ukrainian news site LB.ua (Left Bank) for more than a decade. Its editor-in-chief wrote that two days before the war began, he told her: “The war is about to begin. I have to be at the very epicentre. The Russians will certainly go to chaos, there will be war crimes, we must document all this, fix it.”

Economist correspondent Oliver Carroll shared one of Levin’s final photos on Twitter:

Russian investigative reporter killed in Kyiv

24/3/22: Russian journalist Oksana Baulina was killed by shelling on Wednesday (23 March) while filming from a Kyiv shopping centre. She is the fifth journalist to have died during the invasion of Ukraine.

Baulina was reporting for The Insider, an independent Russian news outlet. Her last report can be read here.

Prior to The Insider, Baulina had worked for opposition leader Alexander Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation. She left Russia in 2021, according to The Guardian.

Earlier, on Monday 21 March, kidnapped Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna was released by Russian forces. A video of Roshchyna saying that the Russian military “saved her life” was real, said her employer Hromadske, but filmed as a condition of her release.

AP journalist on filing from Mariupol

21/3/22: Two AP journalists were put on a Russian “hit list” for their reporting as the last international journalists in the besieged eastern Ukraine city of Mariupol.

Video journalist Mstyslav Chernov and photographer Evgeniy Maloletka reported from the city for more than two weeks before Ukrainian soldiers arrived to get them out.

Chernov has explained why those who had been pleading with them to stay and tell the world about what was happening began to urge them to leave. They were told by a policeman: “If they catch you, they will get you on camera and they will make you say that everything you filmed is a lie. All your efforts and everything you have done in Mariupol will be in vain.”

The journalists also later found out about a “growing Russian disinformation campaign to discredit our work”.

In addition, Victoria Roshchyna, a journalist for Ukrainian digital TV station Hromadske who had been reporting from Eastern and Southern Ukraine, has been missing for more than a week and it is feared she may be being held hostage by Russian forces.

Another Ukrainian journalist who was kidnapped, Oleg Baturin, was reportedly “beaten, threatened with death, without water and food” for eight days but was released on Sunday 20 March. He had been reporting for the Novy Den newspaper.

Fox News journalists killed and injured

16/3/22: Two journalists working for Fox News have been killed and a correspondent injured and hospitalised while working just outside Kyiv in the latest of a series of incidents where journalists have been attacked in Ukraine.

Veteran Fox News cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski, 55, died after his vehicle came under fire in Horenka.

Ukrainian journalist Oleksandra Kuvshynova, known as Sasha, was killed in the same incident. Fox News said the 24-year-old was “serving as a consultant, helping crews navigate Kyiv and the surrounding area while gathering information and speaking to sources”.

Fox News State Department correspondent Benjamin Hall, who was in the same vehicle, was seriously injured and hospitalised. Fox News said on Wednesday he had been able to travel out of Ukraine, was “alert and in good spirits” and “being treated with the best possible care in the world”.

Fox News Media chief executive Suzanne Scott said on Tuesday: “It is with great sadness and a heavy heart that we share the news this morning regarding our beloved cameraman Pierre Zakrzewski.

“Pierre was a war zone photographer who covered nearly every international story for Fox News from Iraq to Afghanistan to Syria during his long tenure with us. His passion and talent as a journalist were unmatched.”

Of Kuvshynova, Scott later said: “She was incredibly talented and spent weeks working directly with our entire team there, operating around the clock to make sure the world knew what was happening in her country.”

Fox News president and executive editor Jay Wallace added that Zakrzewski was a “constant in all of our international coverage” and had a “positive spirit, boundless energy and eye for the story”.

Hall is originally from the UK, has three young daughters, and has worked for Fox since 2015.

Of Hall, Scott said on Monday: “Earlier today, our correspondent Benjamin Hall was injured while newsgathering outside of Kyiv in Ukraine. We have a minimal level of details right now, but Ben is hospitalised and our teams on the ground are working to gather additional information as the situation quickly unfolds.”

Other Fox journalists remain in Ukraine. Scott said: “The safety of our entire team of journalists in Ukraine and the surrounding regions is our top priority and of the utmost importance. This is a stark reminder for all journalists who are putting their lives on the line every day to deliver the news from a war zone.”

US journalist Brent Renaud killed

News of Hall’s injury came a day after another US journalist, Brent Renaud, was shot and killed in the outskirts of Kyiv.

Brent Renaud, who had been reporting for Time and who previously worked for The New York Times, was shot dead on Sunday in the town of Irpin, on the north-western outskirts of the Ukrainian capital.

The BBC reported that two other journalists were injured in the incident, which was attributed to Russian forces by Kyiv police chief Andriy Nebytov. Renaud’s death is the first recorded killing of a foreign journalist during the war.

One of the journalists injured alongside Renaud, photographer Juan Arredondo, reported that they had been spending the day filming refugees fleeing the town that has become a frontline in the Russian assault on Kyiv.

After driving through a checkpoint, Arredondo said guards started shooting at the car the journalists were travelling in, injuring him and killing Renaud.

Time editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal and president Ian Orefice said: “We are devastated by the loss of Brent Renaud. As an award-winning filmmaker and journalist, Brent tackled the toughest stories around the world often alongside his brother Craig Renaud.

“In recent weeks, Brent was in the region working on a Time Studios project focused on the global refugee crisis. Our hearts are with all of Brent’s loved ones. It is essential that journalists are able to safely cover this ongoing invasion and humanitarian crisis in Ukraine.”

Ukrainian journalist missing

Ukrainian journalist Oleg Baturin has disappeared in Kakhovka, a city in Kherson region of Ukraine, according to the European Federation of Journalists.

Baturin, a journalist for the Novy Den newspaper, reportedly left his home at 4pm on 12 March planning to meet a friend at a nearby bus station. He promised to return in 20 minutes, but has not been seen since.

It is suspected that Baturin may have been the victim of an alleged kidnapping by Russian forces in the region, according to reports by The Ukrainian Independent Information Agency.

Swiss journalist wounded

Swiss journalist Guillaume Briquet was wounded and hospitalised on Sunday 6 March after Russian soldiers fired on his car marked PRESS. They reportedly confiscated his passport, 3,000 Euros in cash and his laptop, according to Ukraine-based news outlet Hromadske.

Briquet later told Reporters Without Borders: “They were less than 50 metres away. They clearly shot to kill. If I hadn’t ducked, I would have been hit. I’ve been fired on before in other war zones, but I’ve never seen this. Journalists traveling around the country with no war experience are in mortal danger.”

According to RSF, he was injured in the face and arm by glass splinters from his windshield, and bullets came within centimetres of his head.

Jeanne Cavelier, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said: “As this incident clearly illustrates, reporters in the field are targets for belligerents despite all the rules protecting journalists. They are civilians, who are keeping the world informed about the progress of the fighting. They must be able to work safely.

“We therefore call on all parties to the conflict to immediately commit to protecting journalists in the field in accordance with international law. We also recommend that journalists exercise the utmost caution in the light of the many attacks by Russian commandos sent ahead as scouts.”

Alaraby TV journalists under fire

A crew for London-based Arab TV channel Alaraby TV came under fire on Sunday 6 March.

Reporter Adnan Can and cameraman Habib Demirci were shot at in their car in a Kyiv suburb despite the vehicle having a white flag and “press” signs attached to it. The pair then hid with residents while fighting was taking place according to The New Arab, which is part of the same media network.

Cameraman killed in attack on Ukraine TV transmitter

On Tuesday, 1 March, Ukrainian news cameraman Yevhenii Sakun was killed when Russian forces shelled a television tower in Kyiv.

Sakun, 49, had been covering the Russian invasion for the Ukrainian TV station LIVE. Four others are believed to have died in that attack.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, TV broadcast towers have been shelled in other Ukrainian cities.

Sky’s Stuart Ramsay wounded in ambush

Sky News chief correspondent Stuart Ramsay has revealed how he was badly wounded in an ambush outside Kyiv – one of a number of journalists attacked in Ukraine.

The incident occurred on Monday, 28 February, but only came to light several days later following the escape of his Sky team from the country. He was replaced in Kyiv by Sky News special correspondent Alex Crawford.

Writing in the Daily Mail Ramsay explained how the Sky team’s rental Hyundai saloon was hit with up to 1,000 bullets in a targeted attack that continued despite their shouts of “journalist”.

Producer Dominique van Heerden was also in the car as well as cameraman Richie Mockler (who continued filming throughout the attack), producer Martin Vowles and translator Andrii Lytvynenko.

The five managed to scramble away from the car and down a nearby embankment from where they walked to an industrial building.

Ramsay was shot in the upper leg with the bullet wound exiting through his lower back but missing his vital organs.

He said the car was “absolutely shredded” by bullets.

That night the Sky team was rescued by local police, with the local police chief hosting them in his own home

Ramsay believes he was ambushed by a Russian reconnaissance unit.

He said: “The Russians whom we never saw were not fighting a war against uniformed foes in armoured vehicles — but attempting to kill unarmed journalists operating in a standard saloon car in cold blood.”

Ramsay said he plans to return to Kyiv when he has recovered to “bear witness to what I fear is an unspeakable looming catastrophe for the brave people of Ukraine”.

Danish journalists shot

On 26 February, two journalists from the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet were shot while reporting near the eastern Ukrainian city of Ohtyrka.

Unidentified attackers reportedly fired multiple times at reporter Stefan Weichart (who was wounded in the shoulder) and photographer Emil Filtenborg (who was wounded in the legs and back). The pair were clearly identified as journalists on their protective equipment and shouted “press” during the attack. They were able to make their own escape and are expected to recover.

Journalists remain in Ukraine

Hundreds of foreign reporters remain in Kyiv and Ukraine including at least 50 UK journalists.

There is also a large presence of US journalists reporting from Ukraine.

Pictures L-R: PA Wire/Damien Storan and Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Peabody Awards

The post Journalists under attack in Ukraine: Reuters security adviser killed and journalists injured appeared first on Press Gazette.

Press Gazette has ranked the biggest UK and US news publishers on Instagram with four achieving follower-counts above ten million.

We looked at the news publishers from our top 50 UK and US website rankings to compile our new research.

Two publishers – BBC News (27.8 million) and CNN (20 million) – are above the 20 million mark. When Press Gazette last ranked publisher Instagram accounts (in June 2023) BBC News had 7.4m followers on the platform and CNN 4.2m.

The top two on Instagram are followed by the New York Times (18.2 million) and People (13.6 million).

In comparison, only one news publisher (Daily Mail) from the two top 50 lists has topped ten million on Tiktok, the newer platform.

Ladbible does not feature in the latest ranking because it has it has fallen out of the list of the top 50 news websites in the UK. It currently has 14.1 million followers to its biggest Instagram account. Cosmopolitan, The Daily Wire, The Verge, NME, Epoch Times and Gateway Pundit similarly have fallen out of our top 50s so do not eapp

Excluding the impact of Ladbible’s removal, the top seven remain the same – but The Guardian (5.8 million followers) in eighth place has overtaken Buzzfeed and Unilad (both 5.7 million).

The fastest-growing Instagram account over a two-year period was the New York Post, increasing by 74.7% since 2022 to 1.2 million.

It was followed by Healthline Media (up 60% since 2022 to 1.3 million) and UK tabloid the Mirror (up 57% to 441,000).

Four news publishers on our list saw their Instagram followings decline since June 2023: Buzzfeed (down 7%), sister publication Huffpost (3% to 3.2 million), Unilad (down 2%) and The Daily Beast (down 2% to 452,000).

Since June 2023 only, the Mirror was the fastest-growing (up 45%) followed by ITV News (up 34% to 512,000) and the New York Post (up 32%).

But the follower count for BBC News increased the most in absolute terms (2.1 million) since last year - almost double the next largest growth seen by Fox News (up 1.2 million to 9.4 million).

Four added at least one million followers to their counts - also including the New York Times and People.

The percentage of people saying they use Instagram for news has risen from 2% in 2014 to 15% this year in 12 key markets surveyed by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (UK, US, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Denmark, Finland, Japan, Australia, Brazil and Ireland.

It remains behind Facebook, Youtube and Whatsapp in importance but has overtaken Twitter/X and is still ahead of Tiktok and Snapchat.

The post Two news publishers have 20m+ Instagram followers: Leading UK and US titles ranked appeared first on Press Gazette.

Five of the biggest news publishers in the UK and US have increased their core Tiktok followings by more than two million people in just over 18 months.

Press Gazette has updated our ranking of the biggest and fastest-growing news publisher Tiktok accounts, having last done so in January 2023.

The analysis features the 70 news publishers from Press Gazette’s most recent lists of the 50 biggest UK and US news websites that were found on Tiktok. 

Nineteen of the publishers are not included in the growth comparisons as they were not included in our previous analysis – with some of those likely to have been more recent sign-ups to Tiktok. 

The rankings look at each publisher’s main account only but it should be acknowledged that some news outlets create separate accounts for different verticals.

Reuters and The New York Times saw by far and away the biggest percentage increase in their Tiktok following during the period, but this is due to their small followings at the start of 2023.

Among those with over 100,000 followers at the time of our last update, the 371% growth seen by BBC News was the largest.

CNN (238%), GB News (221%), Yahoo News (218%), CNBC (205%) and The Independent (204%) were the other larger accounts to more than triple their follower count.

There was also some impressive growth for local news sites such as the Liverpool Echo (204%) and the Manchester Evening News (193%), though Newcastle’s Chronicle Live (464%) remains small (6,200 followers) despite that growth.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Washington Post (13%) and The Telegraph (14%) took the least advantage of TikTok’s growth.

In terms of absolute growth, there was no matching the Daily Mail, which added 5.6 million new followers over the period. This was more than two million more than any other news publisher in our analysis.

Insider, a section of Business Insider, was a distant second place, adding a still impressive 3.5 million new followers in the period.

CNN (3.1 million), Sky News (2.9 million) and BBC News (2.9 million) also added more than two million followers each since the start of 2023.

The New York Times added almost 750,000 followers from a starting point of under 5,000, while Reuters added over 175,000 from a base of less than 1,000.

Who are the biggest news publishers on Tiktok in the UK and US?

The Daily Mail, which was in third place behind ABC News in January 2023, is now leading the way at the top with nearly ten million followers for its main account on the platform at the time of writing. (Between our data collection and time of publication, it has now surpassed ten million.)

One of its smaller accounts, Daily Mail UK, which has 980,800 followers, would still place comfortably in the top half of the outlets considered. It celebrated surpassing ten million across all its accounts, which also include a global news account and others dedicated to crime, sport, royals, showbiz, the US and Australia, in January this year.

It does have a smaller Tiktok following than Ladbible (13.8 million followers on its main account), but although the younger brand was top of the ranking in 2023 it was not included in our latest update as it is not currently ranked in the top 50 news websites in the UK.

Of the 70 newsbrands covered in this analysis, 21 were followed by more than a million people. This was more than the number (19) who had followings below 100,000.

This increased reach comes off the back of further growth for TikTok, which is now used for news by 8% of people in 12 key markets including the UK and US according to the 2024 Reuters Institute Digital News Report - up from 1% in 2020.

Across all countries surveyed where Tiktok operates, it is now used for news by 13% of people - overtaking X/Twitter (10%) for the first time - and 23% of 18 to 24-year-olds, the report found.

However 27% of Tiktok users said they struggle to detect trustworthy news on the site, the highest of all social media platforms covered. And only 34% of Tiktok users said they pay attention to journalists or news media, preferring online influencers and personalities. By contrast, on X 53% of users say they pay attention to journalists or news media.

Note: This article was updated after publication to add Channel 4 News, which we discovered had been wrongly missed off our list of the UK's top 50 publishers and therefore met the criteria for inclusion on this ranking.

The post Fastest-growing news publishers on Tiktok since start of 2023 revealed appeared first on Press Gazette.

A former Reuters agency leader and ITN News at Ten editor has been appointed to chair UK journalism training body NCTJ.

Sue Brooks will succeed Kim Fletcher, who is stepping down after 20 years on the NCTJ board, in September.

Writing for Press Gazette, Brooks said her journey from being a “17-year-old Derbyshire lass with a handful of ‘O’ levels” to Fleet Street was “completely attainable in 1977” but that journalism has since “become an elite sport”.

She said: “The NCTJ’s efforts to address this are exciting and groundbreaking and the main reason I wanted to be chair of the charity, whose mission is to promote quality, trust and diversity in journalism.”

The NCTJ’s 2023 Diversity in Journalism report said 72% of UK journalists were from professional or upper class backgrounds compared to 44% of all UK workers – and that this trend is currently higher among more junior journalists.

Scroll down to see the exclusive comment piece from Brooks in full

Brooks said another of her priorities as chair would be to help ensure the Community News Project lives on after Meta pulled its funding for more than 100 reporters in under-served communities across the UK.

The NCTJ chair is responsible for overseeing the governance and strategic development of the charity, including the Journalism Skills Academy and the Journalism Diversity Fund.

Brooks joined Reuters in 2015 as global head of news agency products and in 2018 became managing director for Reuters products and news agency strategy. She then became general manager overseeing all commercial and business activities at the agency.

She previously spent 14 years at Associated Press in roles such as director of international products and platforms and director of video transformation.

Before that her jobs included editing ITN’s News at Ten on ITV, Westminster news editor at ITN, and home news editor for Channel 4.

She started her career as a trainee reporter at the age of 17 at the Derby Evening Telegraph, completing her NCTJ training at Richmond College in Sheffield.

NCTJ chief executive Joanne Forbes said Brooks’s “outstanding achievements as a journalist, editorial manager and business leader, and her experience across all media sectors and formats – and, of course, her NCTJ pedigree and passion for our values – make her the perfect choice to be our next chair”.

[Previously on Press Gazette: Reuters boss: ‘If we don’t disrupt ourselves, somebody else is going to do it for us’]

New NCTJ chair Sue Brooks warns journalism has become an ‘elite sport’

I have had a long, joyous and extraordinarily fulfilling career: I have travelled the globe, met some astonishing people and helped lead one of the world’s greatest news organisations. None of it would have been possible without the NCTJ.

For a 17-year-old Derbyshire lass with a handful of ‘O’ levels, a dream of working in Fleet Street was completely attainable in 1977. Indentured to the Derby Evening Telegraph, a course at Richmond College in Sheffield led to the NCTJ’s professional qualification which was the calling card to reporting for local and national radio, some of the best jobs in UK television and senior roles at the world’s two leading news agencies.

Could this happen in 2024? NCTJ research suggests not and, in the 40+ years since I joined the industry, journalism has become an elite sport. The NCTJ’s efforts to address this are exciting and groundbreaking and the main reason I wanted to be chair of the charity, whose mission is to promote quality, trust and diversity in journalism.

[Read more: Working class representation in UK journalism hits record low, report says]

It’s never been more important to ensure journalists better reflect the communities they serve because how can we expect our viewers and readers to trust us if they don’t recognise us? As Lisa Nandy in one of her first interviews as the new Culture Secretary said: “who tells the story, determines what the story is…”

I hope that as she gets to grips with her in-tray, she finds time to read last year’s report on the sustainability of local journalism, published by the Commons DCMS committee which highlighted the harmful impact on communities the decline in local news is having. It specifically called out decreasing participation in civic life and increasing levels of polarisation. The violence ravaging the country this past week bears witness to the impact misinformation and disinformation is having on our towns and cities.

This is why the Community News Project was so transformative, and why it was such a blow when Meta announced it could no longer fund the initiative. More than 280 journalists received NCTJ training over the past five years. Three quarters of them came from under-represented backgrounds. Some 23 publishers were involved in the programme, underpinned by a total $17m donation from Meta.

[Read more: NCTJ’s fight to save Community News Project after ‘heartbreaking’ Meta decision]

Top of my in-tray is to help the talented team at the NCTJ find ways to ensure the Community News Project lives on, because the need for journalism and journalistic skills to understand and explain the world has never been more important and will become even more so if the Labour government reduces the voting age to 16. Ensuring Gen Alpha is informed, sees both sides of the debate and knows how to spot misinformation and disinformation will be fundamental to our democratic processes.

In the four decades since I gained my NCTJ certification the organisation has changed beyond recognition and now sees the need for continuing professional development as important as entry-level qualifications. Its skills academy is committed to equipping mid-career journalists with the knowledge they need – from using AI through resilience training to audience development – to advance their careers and become the newsroom leaders of the future.

Will there be newsrooms to lead? They will look different, for sure, as generative AI is already making an impact on editorial teams. Much has been said and written about the threat it poses, but there are opportunities too. Opportunities which I believe mean the core skills of journalists – making connections, speaking truth to power, mining data to uncover hidden trends – will come to the fore again as the routine, mundane tasks are carried out by machines. Exclusive content is gold dust and the NCTJ’s integral role in ensuring content creators are equipped to harness the new tools at their disposal and use them ethically and effectively, more critical than ever.

Media companies old and new are finding ways to navigate an ever-evolving array of platforms to meet their audiences where they are, as the connection between their brands and their audiences – already weakened by the social media revolution a decade ago – is dissipating with every generation.

The barriers to entry are lowering all the time and generative AI will only make it easier for content creators to find an audience, however niche. Disintermediation is here to stay.

But there is good news too: new brands, some of which are being lauded as potential saviours of local journalism, are expanding – and hiring. There are scores of adverts from some of our biggest – and smallest – news providers on the NCTJ’s jobs board right now.

The 17-year-old me had newsprint in her veins: my dad was a compositor, who spent much of his working life hot metal typesetting. I remember him telling me that I had joined the business too late and had missed the best of it. Ironic given I often wonder if his job contributed to his early cancer-riddled death at 54, but it’s a sentiment that’s been echoed by the old hands at every job I have had since.

Now I’m an old hand who has witnessed and managed more transformation in the business than I ever dreamed possible and can say only one thing with certainty:

The best is still to come.

The post Ex-Reuters agency chief warns journalism has become ‘elite sport’ as she is named next NCTJ chair appeared first on Press Gazette.

An annual photojournalism fellowship was announced by Tina Brown at the Sir Harry Evans Summit in London.

The award will provide a full salary for the course of the fellowship and offer guidance and mentoring by Reuters and Canada’s Globe and Mail.

Applicants must be in the early stages of their career and propose a deep dive project.

The photojournalism fellowship is the second programme offered in Sir Harry’s memory, with the Global Fellowship in Investigative Journalism having run since 2022. The latter offers a monthly salary of c. £4,444 per month, a £1,250 per month living stipend and a one-off expenses payment of £1,800.

Renowned war photographer Don McCullin has agreed to be a judge in the fellow selection process.

Sir Harry’s widow and former New Yorker and Daily Beast editor, Tina Brown, introduced the Sir Harry Evans Memorial Fund (which encompasses both fellowships).

Brown told Press Gazette: “Organisations don’t send photographers to warzones anymore and frequently you find that photojournalists are going there on their own dime and without any backup.

“So, to have the affiliation with Reuters and Globe and Mail not only gives them the financial capacity to do this work, but also gives them the protection of those organisations.”

The fellowship is funded by David Thomson, chairman of Thomson Reuters, who shared a strong friendship with Sir Harry Evans, both of whom appreciated the power of photojournalism.

Brown said: “David cares very much about keeping photojournalism vibrant and alive, and about supporting, if there is such a thing, the young Don McCullins.”

Speaking at the Sir Harry Summit, McCullin expressed his concerns about the future of photojournalism in a media world which seems obsessed with images of the same celebrities. He asked where are the pictures from Gaza and other conflict zones.

Sir Harry Evans (1928-2020) was voted the Greatest British Newspaper Editor by his media peers. He was instrumental in highlighting the Thalidomide scandal and exposing Britain’s cover up of double agent Kim Philby.

He was one of the first trustees of London’s Photographers’ Gallery. He received the Hood Medal of the Royal Photographic Society and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Centre for Photography for his teaching of and dedication to photojournalism.

Out of his 17 books, six of them were about photography and its ethics. His 1978 book Pictures on a Page remains the definitive source about editing and presentation of photographs in the media.

Brown told Press Gazette: “I sometimes see the most amazing pictures used the size of a postage stamp in the New York Times and I think my god, if Harry had been the editor, that picture would have been across the page with a killer heading.”

Asked about her attitude to AI-generated photography, Brown said: “AI may be a good research tool but it’s never going to replace human intelligence or insights.

“An image can lie just as much as prose can.”

The up and running Global Fellowship in Investigative Journalism receives between 400-450 applicants each year from across the world. Brown hopes that it will be a similar case for the photojournalism fellowship.

Durham University, where Sir Harry Evans attended, will exhibit the fellow’s work at the end of the programme.

The post Tina Brown announces Sir Harry Evans fellowship to support budding photographer on deep-dive project appeared first on Press Gazette.

Three-quarters of the UK’s biggest media organisations increased the percentage of women in their top teams in the past year.

Of 34 media organisations big enough to be required to report gender pay data to the Government, 26 (or 76%) increased the proportion of women in their top pay quarter between 2022 and 2023.

As of the latest snapshot date of 5 April 2023, there were more men than women within the top 25% paid employees at 79% of the companies in our analysis. This is down from 91% a year earlier.

Bloomberg (21.7% women), Sun publisher News Group Newspapers (27.5%) and Mirror Group Newspapers (28%) are at the bottom of the table for percentage of women in their top pay band.

It should be noted that the figures cover whole companies, which for some such as Bloomberg and Sky UK will mean a majority of roles are not journalism related.

Two publishers have 50/50 balance in their top teams: Scottish broadcaster STV Television and Newsquest Community Media, the arm of Newsquest that used to be Archant before its 2022 acquisition.

Five publishers have a majority of women in their top quartiles, led by Hearst on 66% and followed by Conde Nast on 58.9% and Haymarket on 53%.

Which? saw the biggest jump, from 27% representation in 2022 to 51% last year. William Reed was up from 39% to 47% while The Independent went from 33.33% to 39.1%.

Despite most having fewer women than men in their top pay quarter, 82% have more women than men in their lowest-paid group.

The exceptions are Which? (24% women in bottom quarter), Newsquest (28%), Press Association (35.8%), Sky UK (46%), Mirror Group Newspapers (48%) and Bloomberg (49%).

This imbalance suggests more women's careers stall after they have children, or there are other reasons they miss out on promotions.

Average UK media gender pay gap now 11%

This is likely to play a large part in the gender pay gap of the industry, which is now at 11% across the 34 publishers ranked by their data for 5 April 2023.

This means that women are on average paid 11% less than men.

This is a marginal improvement from last year when the average was 12%.

The gender pay gap is not about equal pay and whether men and women are paid the same to do the same jobs, but rather can indicate men dominating in higher-paid roles.

Note: Figures for GB News in 2022 are included in our charts but not in our analysis - the broadcaster was late reporting its figures last year so got missed out of our last set of charts, and it has missed the deadline again this year.

The biggest median gender pay gaps are at Bloomberg (23%) and The Independent (22%). Just behind on 19% are Mail publisher Associated Newspapers, Reuters, Sun publisher News Group Newspapers and Conde Nast.

The smallest pay gap was of 5% at both the Press Association (which last year reported equal pay) and Haymarket. Meanwhile Newsquest paid women 68% more on average - the only publisher to skew towards women.

The average median gender pay gap has decreased from 15.7% in 2017. However some individual publishers have seen their pay gaps increase - for example Mail publisher Associated Newspapers (from 15% in 2017 to 19% in 2023), Hearst (from 17% to 18%) and Sky UK (from 8% to 12%)

Some of the publishers seeing the biggest positive change since 2017 have been The Economist (down from 30% to 16%), Telegraph Media Group (from 23% to 11%), Global (from 21% to 11%) and STV (from 17% to 9%).

The Telegraph said in its pay report: "While our gender pay gap has narrowed significantly over the last few years, and noticeably in relation to others across the industry, we know there is still work to do. We remain committed to reducing our pay gap year on year whilst continuing to attract and retain female talent."

We prioritise the median pay gap in our analysis as organisations such as Scottish charity Close the Gap have said the median is "considered to be a more accurate measure as it is not skewed by very low hourly pay or very high hourly pay".

However we also include the mean in our charts because, as Close the Gap added, "we know the very high-paid people tend to be men, and the very low-paid people tend to be women, and the mean paints an important picture of the pay gap because it reflects this issue".

The biggest mean gender pay gap in 2023 was at Conde Nast (27%) followed by The Independent (23%). The smallest mean gender pay gap was at Newsquest (2%) while two had mean pay gaps favouring women: Reach's local arm Local World (women paid 2% more) and CNN (women paid 9% more).

UK media bonus gender pay gaps

Looking at bonuses, men received more bonus pay than women at almost two-thirds (65%) of companies.

The biggest bonus gaps favouring men were at CNN (men receiving 59% more), Bloomberg (56%) and Reuters (53%).

Seven publishers reported equal bonus pay for men and women when looking at the median: Hearst, ITN, BBC, Times Media, News Group Newspapers, Telegraph Media Group and Future.

The biggest negative bonus gaps, meaning women received more, were at Local World (53%) and Newsquest (42%).

Note: The Press Gazette analysis uses the figures for Reach subsidiaries Mirror Group Newspapers and Local World. The full Reach plc figures were added to our tables after publication.

The post More women in top roles as media industry gender pay gap slowly narrows appeared first on Press Gazette.

Editors from the likes of the Daily Mail, The Guardian, The Times and The Telegraph have united in an attempt to bolster an anti-SLAPP bill going through Parliament.

More than 60 editors, writers, publishers, lawyers and academics signed a letter to Justice Secretary Alex Chalk and his colleagues urging an amendment to stop the bill from becoming “ineffective, inaccessible, and ultimately redundant” at cracking down on threatening lawsuits aimed at stifling reporting in the public interest.

Scroll down for the full list of signatories

The amendment, proposed by the UK Anti-SLAPP Coalition, aims to deal with what the signatories called a “fundamental flaw” at the heart of the Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation Bill, a Private Members’ Bill brought by Labour MP Wayne David which is at committee stage in the Commons and has been backed by the Government.

The bill will expand the Government’s crackdown on SLAPPs to all types of stories, as the Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency Act, which passed into law last year, covers only economic crime.

[From September 2023: UK’s top editors call for standalone anti-SLAPP bill]

What about the anti-SLAPP bill needs to change?

The bill defines a SLAPP claim as one intended to restrain the defendant’s “exercise of the right to freedom of speech” on a matter of public interest – and to cause them harassment, alarm, distress or just cost them money.

However the letter warned that requiring courts to make a subjective judgment on the intent of a claimant is a “notoriously difficult, time-intensive, expensive and uncertain process that would undermine the effective operation of the protections the law provides”.

It added: “Using the subjective test will hinder the early dismissal mechanism that sits at the heart of this bill, but by making a small but important amendment, we can ensure courts and judges are able to make timely, consistent and evidence-based determinations of SLAPP cases before legal costs have accrued.”

The letter urged an objective test to be added into the bill instead to “give SLAPP targets greater certainty, while also providing the clarity courts need to effectively apply the new mechanism”.

The signatories also called for the definition of the public interest to be refined.

The bill currently states that reporting on behaviour that is, or is alleged to be, unlawful or to have been a false statement, or on issues of public health and safety, the climate or the environment or an investigation or review being undertaken by a public body, would all be classed as being in the public interest.

The letter said that although these examples are “only illustrative” they “could introduce unnecessary uncertainty” and it is “vital that the definition demonstrates the breadth and diversity of public interest reporting to give confidence to public watchdogs”.

“This close to establishing an anti-SLAPP law that is universal in scope, we must ensure it can live up to the expectations of everyone who speaks out in the public interest,” the letter says. “Only then will free expression be protected.”

Guardian editor-in-chief Katharine Viner said: “SLAPPs threaten free speech and a free press by enabling those with deep pockets to harass, intimidate and exhaust critics with the goal of deterring public interest journalism. We welcome the work to get a workable anti-SLAPP law in place, with these small changes being vital to making that happen.”

Tackling SLAPPs is an area where national newspaper editors across the political spectrum have publicly shown agreement on multiple occasions.

As well as Viner, current and former Daily Mail editors Ted Verity and Paul Dacre, The Telegraph’s Chris Evans, Times editor Tony Gallagher, Sunday Times editor Ben Taylor and The Observer’s Paul Webster all signed the letter.

They were joined by other senior editors including Reuters editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism editor-in-chief and editor Rozina Breen and Franz Wild, Private Eye editor Ian Hislop, Bloomberg News editor-in-chief John Micklethwait, and The Economist editor-in-chief Zanny Minton Beddoes.

Catherine Belton, who is reporting on Russia for The Washington Post and has been subject to libel proceedings labelled a SLAPP about her book Putin’s People, added: “It’s really important that after all the crusading work by NGOs and MPs, journalists don’t end up with a law that is ultimately ineffective or worse, counterproductive, in combating SLAPPs.

“In its current form, the proposed legislation would not improve the situation for any journalist and instead more likely strengthen any claimant’s hand, as it will be near impossible to prove a claimant’s intent. This law must be urgently amended, otherwise we risk shooting ourselves in the foot.”

Alongside Belton, several other journalists who have been the victims of SLAPP lawsuits signed the letter including Guardian investigations correspondent Tom Burgis, who had a libel claim brought by a Kazakh mining giant against his book dismissed by a judge, Bellingcat founder Eliot Higgins, who was pursued by Russia’s failed coup leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, and Clare Rewcastle Brown, who received multiple threats after uncovering a corruption scandal in Malaysia.

Full list of signatories urging amendments to anti-SLAPP bill:

Editorial and media senior management

• Rozina Breen, CEO, The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ)
• Paul Dacre, Editor-in-Chief, DMG Media
• Chris Evans, Editor, The Telegraph
• Tony Gallagher, Editor, The Times
• Alessandra Galloni, Editor-in-Chief, Reuters
• Isabel Hilton, Co-Chair, TBIJ
• Ian Hislop, Editor, Private Eye
• John Micklethwait, Editor-in-Chief, Bloomberg News
• Zanny Minton Beddoes, Editor-in-Chief, The Economist
• Paul Radu, Co-Executive Director, OCCRP
• Richard Sambrook, Co-Chair, TBIJ
• Aman Sethi, Editor-in-Chief, openDemocracy
• Drew Sullivan, Publisher, Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP)
• Ben Taylor, Editor, The Sunday Times
• Emma Tucker, Editor-in-Chief, The Wall Street Journal
• Ted Verity, Editor, The Daily Mail
• Katharine Viner, Editor-in-Chief, The Guardian
• Paul Webster, Editor, The Observer
• Franz Wild, Editor, TBIJ

Associations, foundations and media support organisations

• Lionel Barber, Chairman, The Wincott Foundation
• Sarah Baxter, Director, Marie Colvin Center for International Reporting
• Matthew Caruana Galizia, Director, The Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation
• Anthony Fargo, Director, Center for International Media Law and Policy Studies
• George Freeman, Executive Director, Media Law Resource Center
• Alexander Papachristou, Executive Director of the Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice
• Michelle Stanistreet, General Secretary, National Union of Journalists
• Sayra Tekin, Director of Legal, News Media Association

Lawyers and other legal professionals

• Rupert Cowper-Coles, Partner and Head of Media, RPC
• Matthew Dando, Partner and Head of Media Litigation, Wiggin LLP
• David Hooper, Media Lawyer and writer on SLAPPs, Author, Buying Silence
• Matthew Jury, Managing Partner, McCue Jury & Partners LLP
• Baroness Helena Kennedy of the Shaws KC, Director, International Bar Association’s
• Human Rights Institute
• Nicola Namdjou, General Counsel at Global Witness
• Gill Phillips, Editorial Legal Consultant
• David Price KC
• Pia Sarma, Editorial Legal Director, Times Newspapers Ltd
• Mark Stephens CBE, Lawyer, Co-Chair International Bar Association Human Rights
• Committee, Trustee, Index on Censorship
• Samantha Thompson, Media Defence Lawyer, RPC

Writers, journalists and authors

• Catherine Belton, International investigative reporter, Washington Post, Author, Putin’s
• People
• Tom Bergin, Author and investigative journalist, Reuters
• Richard Brooks, Journalist, Private Eye
• Bill Browder, Author, financier, and Head of Global Magnitsky Justice campaign
• Tom Burgis, Author and investigations correspondent, The Guardian
• Paul Caruana Galizia, Reporter, Tortoise Media
• Bill Emmott, Journalist, author, and former editor-in-chief of The Economist
• Peter Geoghegan, Journalist and author
• George Greenwood, Investigations Reporter, The Times
• Eliot Higgins, Author and journalist
• Edward Lucas, Author, European and transatlantic security consultant and fellow at the
• Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA)
• Thomas Mayne, Researcher and writer
• Trevor Phillips, Broadcaster, writer and chair of Index on Censorship
• Clare Rewcastle Brown, Journalist

Publishers

• José Borghino, Secretary General, International Publishers Association
• Dan Conway, CEO, Publishers Association
• Andrew Franklin, Founder and publisher, Profile Books and trustee of Index on Censorship
• Arabella Pike, Publishing Director, HarperCollins Publishers
• Nicola Solomon, Chief Executive, Society of Authors

Academics

• Peter Coe, Associate Professor in Law, Birmingham Law School, University of Birmingham
• John Heathershaw, Professor of International Relations, University of Exeter
• Andrew Scott, Associate Professor, London School of Economics and Political Science
• Ursula Smartt, Media Lawyer, Associate Professor of Law, Northeastern University London

The post Editors unite in bid to stop anti-SLAPP bill being ‘ultimately redundant’ appeared first on Press Gazette.