Revelations that triggered Jacinta Allan’s resignation as premier and an investigation into how criminals infiltrated Australia’s illicit tobacco trade are among an impressive list of finalists for The Age in the 71st Walkley Awards for Excellence in Journalism.
Staff from The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald have earned a total of 20 nominations across 13 categories, spanning news, photography, feature writing, and cartoons.
Nick McKenzie’s relentless coverage of Big Build corruption, which exposed evidence that the Victorian government was warned of union misconduct and criminal infiltration in the state’s construction sector, earned him three nominations, including Scoop of the Year and the investigative journalism category.
McKenzie, alongside The Age’s Kieran Rooney, Lachlan Abbott, and 60 Minutes producer Garry McNab, are finalists for coverage of a major news event or issue following months of dedicated reporting on the downfall of the Allan government in the aftermath of the scandal.
Investigative reporters Chris Vedelago and Marta Pascual Juanola are finalists in the news report category for their detailed investigation into how organised crime syndicates have seized control of Australia’s multibillion-dollar illicit cigarette market.
Sherryn Groch and Rachael Dexter are nominated in the same category for their investigation revealing how Neo-Nazis infiltrated the March for Australia anti-immigration rallies to incite violence.
Cartoonist Megan Hebert’s insightful work, Discarded, which satirised the Albanese government’s response to domestic violence, has been nominated in the Cartoon of the Year category.
The Age cartoonist Matt Golding also received a nomination in that category for his work Operation Epic Outsourcing.
Political reporters Paul Sakkal and Mike Foley earned a Scoop of the Year nomination for their exclusive report on Barnaby Joyce’s high-profile defection to Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party.
Staff from The Age behind coverage of the nation’s booming illegal tobacco trade are finalists in the Explanatory Journalism category, alongside staff from the Sydney Morning Herald, Brisbane Times, and WAtoday.
Good Weekend senior writer Melissa Fyfe and WAtoday journalist Carla Hildebrandt are nominated in the long feature writing category for their investigation into the death of prominent Jeffrey Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre.
Writer Kylie Moore-Gilbert is also a finalist for her commentary and analysis featured in The Age.
A visual feature detailing plans to reinvent Sydney’s Darling Harbour netted The Age’s Matt Willis a nomination for innovation journalism, alongside The Sydney Morning Herald’s Megan Gorrey and Ricky Blank.
The Age’s editor Patrick Elligett said: “The volume of Walkley nominations for The Age this year is a pleasing endorsement of our mission to provide our subscribers with high-quality journalism.”
More than 1000 works were entered into the awards, and finalists were chosen by leading journalists and judged on strict criteria.
Shona Martyn, chief executive of the Walkley Foundation, said the quality of entries showcased the depth of talent across the media industry.
“This year’s Walkley finalists reflect a year of turmoil in Australia and around the world captured by journalists and photographers who, in some instances, have put their own lives at risk,” Martyn said.
The winners of the Walkley Awards will be announced in Sydney on 19 November.
The announcement of the Walkley nominations comes after an AI-assisted investigation by The Age and 60 Minutes into the medical devices industry won the National Press Club of Australia’s top award for health reporting.
Journalists Liam Mannix, Henrietta Cook, Clay Lucas, and Amelia Ballinger were jointly named the club’s Health Journalists of the Year for what the judges said was an “extraordinary investigative series”.
“The team combined classic investigative reporting with custom-built web-scrapers to extract and analyse 81,000 adverse event reports from the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) database, exposing critical systemic weaknesses in medical device regulation,” a club statement said.
The investigation revealed systemic issues with the system for registering and monitoring medical devices relied on by millions of Australians.
Club president Tom Connell commended the standard of the 42 entries evaluated by an independent judging panel.
“The judges were unanimous in their decision, praising the winning series’ unique blend of technological innovation and old-school reporting that revealed diabetes management devices accounted for seven of the top ten fault-reporting devices in Australia,” the statement said.
The Medical Malfunctions team also won the Health Policy, Health Economics and Business category.
The Sydney Morning Herald’s Kate Aubusson won the Health Innovation category for her “deeply compelling” series Sasha’s Story - A Race to Make a Treatment for a Girl with an Ultra-Rare Disease.
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