The Times dominated the main accolades of the evening winning the coveted Newspaper of the Year Award while the paper’s investigative reporting into tax avoidance by big name stars was recognised in its Scoop of the Year, News Team of the Year and News Reporter of the Year honours.
Alexi Mostrous and Fay Schlesinger’s delve into complex schemes used by celebrities to shield their earnings from the taxman was described by the judges as “a cracking expose that had massive ramifications. Not only did it shock and anger the public it set the public agenda.”
The investigation also won Mostrous the News Reporter of the Year award.
The Press Awards judges said that in a year of Jubilee coverage, The Times was at the top of its game with both print and online news, current affairs and features.
They added: “Offering impressive quality combined with superb scoops, columnists that are among the most well-known in the industry and increasingly innovative digital offerings, it is well on its way to silencing its pay wall critics.”
Its sister paper, The Sunday Times, took home the most awards of the evening winning five prizes in a year in which their chief sports reporter David Walsh’s 14-year investigation into Lance Armstrong and doping was finally vindicated.
The judges described 2012 for Walsh as: “the culmination of a great sports story. Not only did he stick to his guns, he left everyone else in his wake.”
Walsh took home the Sports Journalist of the Year award and was also recognised in their Sports Team of the Year accolade.
The Foreign Reporter of the Year award was delivered posthumously to Marie Colvin who was killed while reporting from Syria for The Sunday Times.
Her powerful report on the scale of suffering in Baba Amr in Syria was tragically her last piece but one the judges described as being “richly deserved of recognition in its own right.
“She was the foreign reporter who set the standard for others to follow. Her last dispatch, a brilliant piece of reportage, shows why she was so revered.”
The award was accepted by John Witherow, acting editor of The Times, who edited its sister paper for 18 years amid a standing ovation for the late reporter.
The Daily Mail took home three awards including Sports Photographer of the Year, Feature Writer of the Year for popular papers and The Best of Humour Award for columnist Craig Brown. Brown also continued his reign from last year in which he became the first person in the history of the awards to collect three prizes by also winning the Critic of the Year Award for his work in the The Mail on Sunday.
The international reach of the Mail Online was recognised by the top prize in the Digital Award in acknowledgement of "its willingness to tear up the formula when the story demanded it, with great use of images and video."
The judges added “The large amount of original content makes it essential reading in the newsrooms of not just competitors, but on an international scale. A must–read, its sidebar of shame is a talking-point in its own right.”
The London Evening Standard won the award for Production and Design Team of the Year for going against the grain of free sheet papers in ensuring that free did not mean lacking in quality. It was praised for keeping evening papers alive and making a profit since it became a free newspaper. The Standard's Nick Curtis also took home the award for Interviewer of the Year for popular papers.
The Sunday Telegraph won two awards including Specialist Journalist of the Year and Front Page of the Year for its ‘History Man’ image of Mo Farah winning the men’s 5,000m to claim his second Olympic Gold.
The Cudlipp Award, in honour of campaigns and investigations in any UK national newspaper, went to the Daily Mirror in recognition of report Brian Reade and the paper’s two decade campaign for justice for the victims of the Hillsborough disaster.
Society of Editors Executive Director Bob Satchwell took home the Journalists’ Charity Award which recognises outstanding contribution to journalism.
Satchwell who is chairman of the judges, said “The awards are a true reflection of the brilliant journalism in UK national newspapers that are admired across the globe.
"The awards, rather than the Leveson report, provide the real evidence of the culture and practice of the British Press."
The winners, in full:
Young Journalist of the Year
Winner: Andrew Dagnell, Sunday Mirror
Highly Commended: Joshi Herrmann, London Evening Standard
Business and Finance Journalist of the Year
Winner: Tom Bergin, Thomson Reuters
Highly Commended: Graeme Wearden, The Guardian
Political Journalist of the Year
Winner: Simon Walters, The Mail on Sunday
Highly Commended: Andrew Pierce, Daily Mail
Foreign Reporter of the Year
Winner: Marie Colvin, The Sunday Times
Highly Commended: Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, The Guardian; David Blair, The Daily Telegraph
ShowBiz Reporter of the Year
Winner: Gordon Smart, The Sun
Highly Commended: Mark Jefferies, Daily Mirror
Sports Journalist of the Year
Winner: David Walsh, The Sunday Times
Highly Commended: Richard Williams, The Guardian
Specialist Journalist of the Year
Winner: Sean Rayment, The Sunday Telegraph
Highly Commended: Robert Verkaik, The Mail on Sunday
Feature Writer of the Year - Broadsheet
Winner: David James Smith, The Sunday Times
Highly commended: Elizabeth Day, The Observer
Feature Writer of the Year - Popular
Winner: Andrew Malone, Daily Mail
Highly commended: David Rose, The Mail on Sunday
Interviewer of the Year - Broadsheet
Winner: Lynn Barber, The Sunday Times
Highly commended: Decca Aitkenhead, The Guardian
Interviewer of the Year - Popular
Winner: Nick Curtis, London Evening Standard
Highly commended: Jenny Johnston, Daily Mail
Columnist of the Year - Broadsheet
Winner: Peter Oborne, The Daily Telegraph
Highly commended: David Aaronovitch, The Times
Columnist of the Year - Popular
Winner: Jane Moore, The Sun
Highly commended: Richard Littlejohn, Daily Mail
Critic of the Year
Winner: Craig Brown, The Mail on Sunday
Highly commended: AA Gill, The Sunday Times
Photographer of the Year
Winner: Phil Noble, Reuters
Highly commended: Tom Pilston, The Times
Sports Photographer of the Year
Winner: Andy Hooper, Daily Mail
Highly commended: Mark Pain, The Mail on Sunday
Cartoonist of the Year
Winner: Dave Brown, The Independent
Highly commended: Matt Pritchett, The Daily Telegraph
Supplement of the Year
Winner: Observer Food Monthly, The Observer
The Digital Award
Winner: Mail Online
Highly commended: Guardian Interactive
The Best of Humour Award
Winner: Craig Brown, Daily Mail
Highly commended: Giles Coren, The Times
Scoop of the Year
Winner: ‘The Tax Avoiders’ - Alexi Mostrous and Fay Schlesinger, The Times
Highly commended: ‘Foster couple lose children for being members of UKIP’ - Sam Marsden, The Daily Telegraph
Front Page of the Year
Winner: ‘History Man’, The Sunday Telegraph
Highly commended: ‘Look at all those people’, Daily Mirror
News Reporter of the Year
Winner: Alexi Mostrous, The Times
Highly commended: Heidi Blake and Jonathan Calvert, The Sunday Times; David Walsh, The Sunday Times
The Cudlipp Award
Winner: Daily Mirror, ‘Hillsborough’
Highly commended: Daily Mail, ‘Gary McKinnon campaign’; Sunday Post, ‘Puzzle firm expose’
Journalists’ Charity Award
Winner: Bob Satchwell, Executive Director, Society of Editors
News Team of the Year
Winner: The Times
Sports Team of the Year
Winner: The Sunday Times
Highly commended: The Times
Production and Design Team of the Year
Winner: London Evening Standard
Highly commended: The Times; i
NEWSPAPER OF THE YEAR: The Times
