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Times is named Press Awards newspaper of the year for exposing Rotherham abuse scandal

By Dominic Ponsford

The Times was last night named newspaper of the year at the Press Awards.

In recent months it has been the only national newspaper in the country to grow sales year on year.

Editor John Witherow said: “It shows that for some people paywalls can work, that newspaper sales can go up even in the very tough market we find ourselves in and the only we you can do that is if you have a brilliant team of journalists as we have at The Times.

The judges praised its “searing investigation” into the Rotherham sex abuse scandal.

The Times reporter who worked on that story, Andrew Norfolk, received the Cudlipp Award for outstanding popular journalism.

He said: “Cudlipp campaigned for the underdog. I hope he would have felt that Rotherham was a tale that needed telling.”

Norfolk was also named reporter of the year.

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The Georgina Henry prize for innovation (open only to female journalists) went to Laura Bates of the website Everyday Sexism.

Scoop of the year went to The Mail on Sunday for "62p an hour" the story revealing the low pay and poor working conditions of women who were making the "This is What A Feminist Looks Like" T-shirts.

The 31 awards were presented at the Marriott Grosvenor Square Hotel in central London last night.

Organised by the Society of Editors, the Press Awards recognise national newspaper journalism.

Full list of winners:

Young Journalist

Winner: Peter Campbell – Daily Mail

Business and Finance Journalist

Winner: Simon Goodley – The Guardian

Highly commended: Ambrose Evans-Pritchard – The Daily Telegraph

Political Journalist

Winner: Matthew Parris – The Times

Highly commended: Janan Ganesh – Financial Times

Foreign Reporter

Winner: Patrick Cockburn – The Independent and i

Highly commended: Anthony Loyd – The Times

Science and Health Journalist

Winner: Andrew Gregory – Daily Mirror

Highly commended: Steve Connor – The Independent and i

Showbiz Reporter

Winner: Halina Watts – Daily Mirror

Highly commended: Simon Cable – Freelance (Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, The Mail on Sunday) and Richard Brooks – The Sunday Times

Sports Journalist

Winner: Matt Lawton – Daily Mail

Highly commended: Ian Herbert – The Independent and i

Specialist Journalist

Winner: Pilita Clark – Financial Times

Highly commended: Dan Hyde -The Daily Telegraph

Interviewer of the Year (Pop)

Winner: Rebecca Hardy – Daily Mail

Highly commended: Frances Hardy – Daily Mail

Interviewer of the Year (Broadsheet)

Winner: Bryan Appleyard – The Sunday Times

Highly commended: Simon Hattenstone – The Guardian

Feature Writer (Pop)

Winner: Tom Parry – Daily Mirror

Highly commended: Joshi Herrmann – London Evening Standard

Feature Writer (Broadsheet)

Winner: Anthony Loyd – The Times

Highly commended: Patrick Strudwick – The Independent and i

Columnist (Pop)

Winner: Quentin Letts – Daily Mail

Highly commended: Brian Reade – Daily Mirror

Columnist of the Year (Broadsheet)

Mark Steel – The Independent and i

Highly commended: Fraser Nelson – The Daily Telegraph and Howard Jacobson -The Independent

Critic

Winner: David Sexton – London Evening Standard

Highly commended: Michael Deacon – The Daily Telegraph

Photographer

Winner: Rowan Griffiths -Daily Mirror

Highly commended: Ben Birchall – Press Association and Stefan Rousseau – Press Association

Sports Photographer

Winner: Marc Aspland – The Times

Highly commended: Martin Rickett – Press Association

Cartoonist

Winner: Peter Brookes – The Times

Highly commended: Matt Pritchett – The Daily Telegraph

Scoop

Winner: "62p an hour", Ben Ellery, The Mail on Sunday

Highly commended: "Boxing legend Frank: I'm now a woman", Matthew Drake, Sunday Mirror and "Fifa Files: Plot to buy the World Cup", Insight, The Sunday Times

News Reporter

Winner: Andrew Norfolk – The Times

Highly commended: Insight – The Sunday Times and Ben Ellery – The Mail on Sunday

The Digital Award

Winner: Daily Mirror

Highly commended: The Guardian

Front Page

Winner: "Here is the news, not the propaganda" – The Independent on Sunday

Highly commended: "62p an hour" – The Mail on Sunday and "The Vow" – Daily Record

Supplement

Winner: The Times Magazine

Highly commended: Notebook – Sunday Mirror

Business Team

Winner: Financial Times

Highly commended: The Times

Sports Team

Winner: Daily Record

Highly commended: Mail Sport

News Team

Winner: The Sunday Times

Highly commended: Sunday People

The Cudlipp Award

Winner: "My Battle for the Lost Girls of Rotherham" – The Times

Highly commended: "Kids in Crisis" – Daily Mirror

The Journalists' Charity Award

Winner: Matt Pritchett – The Daily Telegraph

The Georgina Henry Women in Journalism Prize for Innovation

Winner: Laura Bates – Everyday Sexism

Highly commended: Iram Ramzan -Interactive blog for moderate Muslim voices

Chairman's Award

Winner: Jonathan Grun, emeritus editor, Press Association

Newspaper of the Year

Winner: The Times

 

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