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ABC Four Corners and Fairfax journalist Adele Ferguson win Gold Walkley for bank probe

Walkley AwardsFairfax Media’s Adele Ferguson and the ABC’s Four Corners team have won Australian journalism’s top award, the Gold Walkley, for their investigation into unethical business practices at the Commonwealth Bank.

Ferguson spent two years uncovering poor advice given to consumers and, along with with Deb Masters and Mario Christodoulou from the ABC, coaxed victims to speak out on a Four Corners TV production, “Banking Bad”.

Banking Bad also won the award for best TV/AV Weekly Current Affairs program at last night’s Walkley Awards, held in Darling Harbour and attended by 800 figures from the media world.

Jailed Al Jazeera correspondent Peter Greste won the outstanding contribution to journalism award. To a standing ovation, his brother Andrew accepted the award, ending his speech by saying: “stay strong brother, let’s get you home for Christmas.”

A joint Guardian Australia and ABC story which revealed Australia’s attempts to spy on Indonesia’s President Susilo Yudhoyono won the scoop of the year with Michael Brissenden, Ewan MacAskill and Lenore Taylor picking up the awards.

The Australian Financial Review team of Nabila Ahmed, Sue Mitchell and James Chessell picked up the Walkley for business journalism while Paul Maley and Greg Bearup from the Australian won the Best Print/Text Journalism category for uncovering Australian links to Syrian terrorist activity.

The story of Baby Gammy, which revealed that a boy with down syndrome was left in Thailand with his surrogate mother while his healthy twin sister was taken home to Australia, won the international journalism award for Lindsay Murdoch from The Age, with Matt Brown, Hayden Cooper, Aaron Hollett, Stuart Watt, Michael Carey and the ABC news teams picking up Best Coverage of a Major News Event or Issue for their reporting on the Gaza conflict.

John Lyons, Sylvie Le Clezio, Janine Cohen and Mary Fallon from the ABC and The Australian won the investigative journalism Walkley for their work in Palestine and Irael.

Industry veteran Bon Cronin, editor-in-chief of The West Australian picked up the leadership gong, Robert Dillon from the Newcastle Herald won the award for sports journalism and David Speers from Sky News received the Walkley for best interview for his grilling of  federal attorney-general, Senator George Brandis.

 The full list of winners:

PRINT/TEXT NEWS REPORT
Proudly supported by Media Super
Paul Maley and Greg Bearup, The Australian: “That’s my boy: kids witness war’s horror”, “Plotter’s nephew in Syrian combat”, “Aussie fighters leading extremist PR: ASIO”

ALL MEDIA SOCIAL EQUITY JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by Seven Network
Belinda Hawkins, Australian Story, ABC TV: “Searching for C11, Parts One and Two”, “Breaking the Code”

ALL MEDIA MULTIMEDIA STORYTELLING
Proudly supported by News Corp Australia
SBS Online Team, SBS Online: “Cronulla Riots – The day that shocked the nation”

NIKON-WALKLEY PHOTO OF THE YEAR
Proudly supported by Nikon
Andrew Quilty, TIME LightBox: “Baby burns victim in Boost Hospital”

ALL MEDIA HEADLINE JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by Women in Media
Paul Whittaker, The Daily Telegraph: “Cardinal spin”, “The Grapes of Bof”, “Palmersnorus”

ALL MEDIA COVERAGE OF INDIGENOUS AFFAIRS
Proudly supported by NITV
Paul Daley, Guardian Australia: “Why does the Australian War Memorial ignore frontier war?”, “The bone collectors”, “Indigenous Australians in wartime”

ALL MEDIA COVERAGE OF COMMUNITY AND REGIONAL AFFAIRS
Proudly supported by Coles
Ben Smee, NT News: “Chasing the circus: A year of chaos and scandal in Territory politics”

ALL MEDIA SPORTS JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by BDO
Robert Dillon, Newcastle Herald: ““Bye Bye Boganaire”

SPORT PHOTOGRAPHY
Proudly supported Nikon
Cameron Spencer, Getty Images: “H20 Action”

RADIO NEWS AND CURRENT AFFAIRS JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by ABC
Hayden Cooper, ABC Radio: “Journalism on trial”

RADIO DOCUMENTARY, FEATURE, PODCAST OR SPECIAL
Proudly supported by QUT
Sarah Dingle, AM and Background Briefing, ABC Radio: “The Salvos: A matter of trust”

FEATURE WRITING LONG (OVER 4000 WORDS)
Proudly supported by Australia Post
Paul Toohey, Quarterly Essay 53: “That Sinking Feeling: Asylum seekers and the search for the Indonesian solution”

ALL MEDIA SCOOP OF THE YEAR
Proudly supported by Nine Network
Michael Brissenden, Ewen MacAskill and Lenore Taylor, ABC News and Guardian Australia: “Australia’s spy agencies targeted Indonesian president’s mobile phone”

ALL MEDIA CARTOON
Proudly supported by Epson
Ron Tandberg, The Age: “Joe’s budget”

ALL MEDIA ARTWORK
Proudly supported by Private Media
Eric Lobbecke, The Australian: “Chopper Hockey”

ALL MEDIA COVERAGE OF A MAJOR NEWS EVENT OR ISSUE
Proudly supported by AAP
Matt Brown, Hayden Cooper, Aaron Hollett, Stuart Watt, Michael Carey and ABC News Team, ABC News Digital, ABC TV News and ABC Radio: “Gaza Conflict”

FEATURE WRITING SHORT (UNDER 4000 WORDS)
Proudly supported by Fairfax Media
Ruth Pollard, Fairfax Media: “If this happened in Europe, the world would not be silent”

NEWS PHOTOGRAPHY
Proudly supported by Nikon
Brendan Beirne, News Corp Australia: “Bondi Biffo”

ALL MEDIA BUSINESS JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by ING Direct
Nabila Ahmed, Sue Mitchell and James Chessell, The Australian Financial Review: “Myer, DJs Merger proposed just before directors’ trade”, “DJs chairman must step down”, “Mason to purge DJs board”

FEATURE/PHOTOGRAPHIC ESSAY
Proudly supported by Nikon
Eddie Jim, The Age: “Hayden”

ALL MEDIA INTERNATIONAL JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by Lion
Lindsay Murdoch, The Age: “Baby Gammy was left behind”

ALL MEDIA CAMERAWORK
Proudly supported by Australian Super
Wayne McAllister, ABC News and Foreign Correspondent, ABC TV: “Laksi violent protest”, “Spratley Islands: reef madness” “Ukraine crash site fight”

TV/AV NEWS REPORTING
Proudly supported by Banki Haddock Fiora
Matt Brown and Mark Solomons, ABC News: “Syria death”, “Jihad middleman”, “Bomber video”

TV/AV DAILY CURRENT AFFAIRS
Proudly supported by SBS
Nick McKenzie, Richard Baker and Sam Clark, 7.30, ABC TV: “State of the union”, “Jobs for the boys”

TV/AV WEEKLY CURRENT AFFAIRS
Proudly supported by ABC
Adele Ferguson, Deb Masters and Mario Christodoulou, Four Corners, ABC TV and Fairfax Media: “Banking bad”

ALL MEDIA INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by Bayer
John Lyons, Janine Cohen, Sylvie Le Clezio and Mary Fallon, Four Corners, ABC TV, and The Australian: “Stone cold justice”

ALL MEDIA INTERVIEW
Proudly supported by Network Ten
David Speers, Sky News: “What is metadata?”

ALL MEDIA COMMENTARY, ANALYSIS, OPINION AND CRITIQUE
Proudly supported by iSentia
Waleed Aly, Fairfax Media: “Brandis race hate laws are whiter than white”, “The logic of PNG policy is sanctioned horror”, “Deciding which deaths matter and which don’t”

WALKLEY DOCUMENTARY AWARD
Proudly supported by Linc Energy
Dan Goldberg and Danny Ben-Moshe, Mint Pictures & Identity Films/ABC TV: Code of Silence

WALKLEY BOOK AWARD
Proudly supported by Media Super
Paul Kelly, Triumph and Demise: The Broken Promise of a Labor Generation, Melbourne University Press

NIKON-WALKLEY PRESS PHOTOGRAPHER OF THE YEAR
Proudly supported by Nikon
Andrew Quilty, Oculi

LEADERSHIP
Proudly supported by Qantas
Bob Cronin, West Australian

MOST OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTION TO JOURNALISM
Proudly supported by Sky NEWS
Peter Greste

GOLD WALKLEY
Proudly supported by MEAA
Adele Ferguson, Deb Masters and Mario Christodoulou, Four Corners, ABC TV and Fairfax Media, “Banking bad”

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