Pagefield Press Awards and Case for Campaigning

By Harry Gault

Wednesday 23rd November

Last night marked the culmination of the Pagefield Press Awards and the launch of Pagefield’s Case for Campaigning ‘ Best Campaign of the Past Decade’ Award.

At Pagefield’s Autumn drinks reception, broadcasting legend Alastair Stewart announced the four winners of the Press Awards, and the winner of the ‘Best Campaign of the Past Decade’.

The first winner to be announced was Aubrey Allegretti, Political Correspondent at The Guardian, who won the award for ‘Journalist whose influence grew and grew this year’. At The Guardian, Aubrey has made a name for himself through his tireless reporting on the inner workings of the Conservative Party. Rising to prominence in part through his connectedness to a newer generation of Tory MPs, Aubrey is certainly an asset to the usually left-leaning Guardian.

The BBC’s Disinformation and Social Media Correspondent Marianna Spring was announced as the winner of the ‘Up-and-coming broadcast journalist of the year’ award. An increasingly regular fixture across programmes like Panorama, Marianna’s investigative instinct and presentational brilliance sets her apart from the rest of the shortlisted candidates.

The third category – the ‘Business or economic journalist of the year’ award – was given to Sky News’ Ian King. Of the winners, Ian stands out as one of the more experienced journalists recognised in this year’s Press Awards. A business journalist for over 25 years, his show ‘Ian King Live’ has become known for hosting some of the biggest chief executives in the country, to some of the most exciting and aspiring entrepreneurs.

Finally, The Guardian’s Anna Isaac was the well-deserved winner of the ‘Scoop of the year’ award. Anna has recently joined The Guardian from The Independent where she was Economics Editor. While at The Independent, Anna revealed that the wife of then Chancellor Rishi Sunak, Akshata Murthy, had claimed non-domicile tax status and was therefore avoiding paying tax in the UK. As one of the judges, the Financial Times’ Jim Pickard, said: “This was a brilliant scoop which knocked the wind out of the sails of Rishi Sunak, until then an almost untouchable highflying politician.”

Before Alastair Stewart announced the winner of the Case for Campaigning ‘Best Campaign of the Past Decade’ award, Pagefield chief executive Oli Foster thanked the panel of opinion leaders who helped decide upon a list of the top 10 campaigns. The panel included Starling Bank CEO Anne Boden, HS1 Ltd CEO Dyan Crowther, Daily Telegraph Associate Editor Camilla Tominey and PR Week News Editor James Halliwell. Also on the panel was former UK Ambassador to the United States and Pagefield Chairman Sir Christopher Meyer, who sadly died this summer. Oli invited everyone to pay tribute to Sir Christopher Meyer, himself a fierce defender of the right to campaigning and values of a free society.

The winner of the ‘Best Campaign of the Past Decade’ was awarded to Anna Taylor, Executive Director at the Food Foundation, for her joint campaign to tackle food poverty with Manchester United and England player Marcus Rashford. As recently as September, Rashford announced that he had set up the Child Food Poverty Task Force in collaboration with the Food Foundation. Their tireless campaigning has resulted in the Government announcing earlier this month that it would provide funding of almost £400 million over the next 12 months to support the cost of household bills to struggling families.

Another congratulations to the winners and all those that were shortlisted.

 

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