Journalists from Michael West Media have scooped the pool in this year’s Walkey Awards for Excellence in Journalism taking home no less than 28 Walkeys*.
This year’s Gold Walkey (not sponsored by Woodside) was a hard-fought affair with Rex Patrick taking out the gong for his body of work on government transparency and Australia’s 60-year campaign to steal Timor’s oil and gas.
Rex Patrick with his Gold Walkey
Veteran journalist, Wendy Bacon, joins the giants of Australia’s media landscape as an inductee of the prestigious Walkey Hall of Fame. Bacon also won the award for Outstanding Contribution to Journalism with Yaakov Aharon for their body of work as MWM Special Envoys for Combatting Antisemitism Scams (not sponsored by the Tel Aviv litigation budget of the Zionist Federation of Australia).
Wendy Bacon Walkeys Hall of Fame
Bacon and Patrick led the charge in a humongous year for independent outfit Michael West Media at Australia’s most venerable and glamorous awards night. Other winners included Josh Barnett, Stephanie Tran, Michael Pascoe, Kim Wingerei, Sarah Russell, Yaakov Aharon, Harry Chemay, Stuart McCarthy, Zach Szumer.
Wendy Bacon also took home the Walkey Award for Investigative Journalism (not sponsored by the Victor Chang Institute) for her intrepid coverage of the St Vincent’s Hospital debacle and was runner-up for coverage of foreign lobbyists and fossil fuel lobbyists interfering in Australian governments.
Truly a watershed
Commenting on the watershed moment in world journalistic history, MWM founder Michael West thanked the community, politicians and business leaders, and particularly the Walkey judges for their debonaire taste.
“We couldn’t have done it without the judges,” said West in a teary acceptance speech. “Me and the judges, we’re mates,” he told the large audience which was clearly moved by the occasion. “But we also owe a debt of gratitude to Australia’s politicians and business leaders for providing such good material to work with – and of course to our platinum sponsors NotSantos and NotPwC”.
Stephanie Tran has won Young Journalist of the Year (sponsor Not Accenture) and was runner-up in the Walkey Scoop segment for uncovering the billion-dollar coal scam on workers with her entry Private Tax Collectors (sponsor Not BHP).
Stephanie Tran Walkey Young Journalist of the Year
Josh Barnett, Global Executive Director The West Report Multimedia, was without peer in the visual categories, winning both Television Video Current Affairs shortform and longform awards for Australia’s Baby Bust and the Fall of Triple J. (Sponsor Not Deloitte)
Josh Barnett TV and Current Affairs Walkey winner
Legendary commentator Michael Pascoe has romped in as winner of the Business Walkey (sponsored by Not KPMG) for consistently getting interest rates right this year as opposed to directors of the Reserve Bank of Australia and the mainstream finance press. He was also commended for his work in tearing strips off shady operators.
“Not another award!”. Walkey winner Michael Pascoe
MWM publisher and journalist Kim Wingerei took out the Walkey Award for Public Interest Journalism for his expose Peter Dutton’s Nuclear Plant to cost $4.3 trillion (not $600 billion). We thank the sponsors NotNewsCorp.
Kim Wingerei proud Walkey Award winner
In the Social Equity category sponsored by Not EY, the judges awarded the honours to Dr Sarah Russell who broke the story, Pay per Shower, of the government allowing private operators to make a profit out of old and helpless people having a shower because, as everybody knows, taking a shower is an aged care luxury and not a need for elderly Australians such as basic necessities like paying for a Foxtel subscription.
Harry Chemay’s excellent financial analyses of the housing market also attracted the attention of the judges, particularly his Hunger Games trilogy, his work on superannuation, and banking, citing Mortgage Mountain.
Runners-up were Alison Battisson and Janet Pelly for their excellent reporting and analysis of the Government’s shonkiest deal of the year, the $2B shifty payment to Nauru which helped to finance the bikie gang community and corrupt Nauru officials who are secretly planning to pack Australia’s asylum seekers back to the countries from which they fled.
Duncan Graham, Indonesian correspondent, took out the International Walkey with his body of work which included the yarn about the millions spent capturing poor Indonesian fishermen diving for sea slugs, and Australia’s Border Farce expose on asylum seekers.
In the Comment and Analysis category, it was a dead heat. Andrew Gardiner got the gong with his The many hats of Julie Bishop entry (sponsored by not Boston Consulting Group). He shares it jointly with Australia’s best defence correspondent Stuart McCarthy with Who Knew, but we are splitting hairs here as every story by Stuart is worth a Walkey.
Although hoping to return to the Podium after years in the Walkey Wilderness, Michael West, missed out this year. His scoop The Kings’ School Headmaster Controversy might have won the scoop but the actual The King School headmaster remains, incredibly, still in the job.
And his BHP’s big wage theft unveiled attracted a lot of readership but it was too big a fraud for anybody to do anything about, and remains in the court to this day.
Nevertheless, efforts to bribe and threaten the judges came to nought so West grabbed somebody else’s Walkey Award for the photograph anyway.
- Editor’s Note: this is satire. The Walkleys is on tomorrow night.
Michael West established Michael West Media in 2016 to focus on journalism of high public interest, particularly the rising power of corporations over democracy. West was formerly a journalist and editor with Fairfax newspapers, a columnist for News Corp and even, once, a stockbroker.