The Walkey Award nomination were dur to be announced at 7pm on Wednesday evening, but true to form, Crikey was there first, sending the list out to subscribers at 5pm. Here’s what they read:

It’s not hard to get nominated for the Walkley Awards, the nation’s premier prizes for excellence in jounalism. Just sign a form and send it in to the journo’s union, the MEAA. The real trick is getting shortlisted. This is the cream of the crop, and the highly anticipated list is to be announced tonight by the good comradesd at the Mee Too union.

But why wait? Crikey has been slipped the list in advance, so check it out for yourself onsite here but please don’t do it if you want a surprise at the various functions across the country tonight.

There are some very interesting nominations. First: why are there two separate nominations from The AFR for their series on Rene Rivkin, Trevor Kennedy, Richo and their Swiss banking dealings?

In the Business Journalism section, there is a nomination from the ‘AFR Team’, “Rivkin’s Swiss Bank Scandal” – Neil Chenoweth, Shagra Elam; Colleen Ryan; Andrew Main; Rosemarie Graffagnini.

But, lo and behold, in the Investigative Journalism finalists, we see a nomination for “Neil Chenoweth, Shraga Elam and Rosemarie Graffagnini, The Australian Financial Review, ‘The Money Trail to Zurich'”.

How come different personnel get nominated for the same series of reports? Just who is in the AFR “team” – and who is not? In the immortal words of cashed-up senate loser Pauline Hanson: “please explain?”

What’s clear is that the Fin’s finance hacks will win both categories – and also deserve to win the Gold Walkley for a superb and detailed scoop that shook the business and political worlds. Their series of scoops stands out from the crowd. But will the five person “Team” win the Gold or the three person alternative?

Other pleasing short-listings were 2UE’s Alison Carabine for her outstanding reporting on the coup against Simon Crean, and The Age’s Gay Alcorn, Mal Schmidtke and Liz Minchin, for their feature: ‘Young Latham’, in our view the best meeja profile of Iron Mark.

The Walkey winners won’t be announced until November 27, but some winners and losers have already emerged from the list of finalists as the following lists indicate:

PRINT

The category of print was dominated by Fairfax even though Fairfax produces half the number of publications as rival News Ltd. News’s list wouldn’t even be as long is it is if were not for the help of its creative team who did well in the cartoon, artwork and graphics categories. News Ltd cannot be please that Fairfax scooped all the finalists in the newspaper and magazine feature writing categories. However, Fairfax must be equally displeased that their business magazine BRW was completely out performed by rival ACP publication The Bulletin.

News Ltd finalists:

Rory Callinan, The Australian, “Hicks Torture Revealed” (news report finalist)

Patrick Smith, The Australian, “Colour of money” (commentary and analysis finalist)

Ian Gunn, The Australian, “Heads and Tales” (3 headlines finalist)
The Australian Design and Graphic Team, The Australian and The Weekend Australian, “The Australian Megagraphics Series” (editorial graphics and design finalists)
Tom Jellett, The Weekend Australian, “Bookshop” (artwork finalist)
Mark Knight, Herald Sun, “Benefits Of A Bedtime Story” (cartoon finalist)

Neil Matterson, Sunday Mail, “Precisely” (cartoon finalist)

Ellen Whinnett, The Mercury, “Richard Butler” (news report finalist)

Fairfax finalists:


Tom Allard, The Sydney Morning Herald, “The Government, the ADF and Abu Ghraib” (news report finalist)

Ruth Pollard, The Sydney Morning Herald, “Critical condition” (feature writing finalist)
SMH Team, The Sydney Morning Herald, “The Great Schools Debate” (best use of the medium)

Paul McGeough, The Sydney Morning Herald, “The aftermath of war” (international journalist finalist)

Matthew Moore and Robert Wainwright, The Sydney Morning Herald, “Kebab shop smuggler” (coverage of Asia-Pac region)

Malcolm Knox and Caroline Overington, The Sydney Morning Herald, “Norma Khouri Investigation” (investigative finalist)

Debra Jopson and Gerard Ryle, The Sydney Morning Herald, “Black Land, White Shoes” (indigenous affairs)

Jacquelin Magnay, The Sydney Morning Herald, “Cycling’s Shooting Gallery” (sport finalist)

Elisabeth Sexton, The Sydney Morning Herald, “James Hardie and the Asbestos Disgrace” (business finalist)

Paul McGeough, The Sydney Morning Herald, “Bush, the US and the War” (commentary and analysis finalist)
Gay Alcorn, Mal Schmidtke and Liz Minchin, The Age, “Young Latham” (feature writing finalist)

Bruce Petty, The Age, “Good v Evil” (cartoon finalist)

Andrew Dyson, The Age, “Media Software” (artwork finalist)

Matthew Absalom-Wong, Hugh J Martin, Simon Johanson John Silvester, TheAge, “Gangland” (best use of the medium)

Lindy Percival, The Sunday Age, “Up yours, Cazaly” (3 headlines finalist)
Kathy Evans, The Sunday Age, “Tuesday’s Child” (social equity finalist)

AFR Team, The Australian Financial Review, “Rivkin’s Swiss Bank Scandal” – Neil Chenoweth, Shagra Elam, Colleen Ryan, Andrew Main, RosemarieGraffagnini (business finalist)

Neil Chenoweth, Shraga Elamand Rosemarie Graffagnini, The AustralianFinancial Review, “The Money Trail to Zurich” (investigative finalist)

Laura Tingle, The Australian Financial Review, “Federal politics 2003-04” (commentary and analysis finalist)

Tony Walker, The Australian Financial Review, “Battleground USA” (feature writing finalist)

Jane Cadzow, Good Weekend, “The Right Thing” (magazine feature finalist)

Andrew Rule, Good Weekend, “A Sniper’s Tale” (magazine feature finalist)

Janet Hawley, Good Weekend, “Troubled Waters, John Konrads” (sport finalist)

ACP finalists:


Andrew Forbes, The Bulletin, “Off with his heads” (3 headlines finalist)

Julie-Anne Davies, The Bulletin, “Suffer the Children” (magazine feature finalist)

Michael Bain, James George Bennett, Soumali Chitdamrong and StephenMurray, The Bulletin, “Super Human” (editorial graphics and design finalists)

Ross Greenwood, Nine Network and The Bulletin, “Telstra’s Fling for Fairfax” (Business finalist)

Julie-Anne Davies, The Bulletin, “Suffer the Children” (indigenous affairs)

John Lyons, The Bulletin, “George Gregan and The Enemy Within” (sport finalist)

Hall Greenland, The Bulletin, “A Dying Shame” (social equity finalist)


RADIO

The ABC dominated radio, claiming all three finalists in the Radio Feature category and the Radio Current Affairs category. 2UE was the only other station to get a look in, with two finalists in the Radio News Reporting category and a nod to Mike Carlton for his broadcast interviewing.

ABC radio finalists:


PeterCave, ABC, “Iraq Hostage” (radio news reporting finalist)

David Hardaker, PM and AM, ABC, “David Flint: Going, going . . . gone” (radio current affairs reporting finalist)

Rafael Epstein and Nick McKenzie, PM and AM, ABC, “Police Corruption” (radio current affairs reporting finalist)

Mark Willacy, AM, ABC, “Martyrs for the Cause” (radio current affairs reporting)

Phillip Adams, Chris Bullock, Mary Louise O’Callaghan and Paul Gough, LateNight Live, ABC Radio National, “Solomon Islands Series” (radio feature, doco or special finalist)

Nick Franklin, Mayu Kanamori, Tom Fitzgerald and Adrei Shabunov, ABC Radio National, “Chika” (radio feature, doco or special finalist)

Stephen Skinner, Background Briefing, ABC Radio National, “Bulldozers, Trees and Making a Quid” (radio feature, doco or special finalist)

2UE finalists:


Mike Carlton, Radio 2UE, “Three Talking Heads” (broadcast interviewing finalists)

Kylie Simmonds, Radio 2UE, “Doyalson Fire” (radio news reporting finalist)

Alison Carabine, Radio 2UE, “Canberra Coup: Labor turns on Simon Crean” (radio news reporting finalist)


TELEVISION

It was the same story in TV with the ABC scooping up the lion’s share of the finalists, leaving Channel Nine a distant second, SBS third with a respectable 4 finalists and Seven fourth with just one, while Channel Ten missed out all together.

ABC TV finalists:


PeterCave, ABC TV News, ABC TV, “Iraq Hostage” (TV news reporting finalist)

Rebecca Morse, ABC TV News, ABC TV, “Archbishop Resignation” (TV news reporting finalist)

Andrew Geoghegan, Jacquelyn Hole and Belinda Sommer, The 7:30 Report, ABC TV, “System Failure” (short current affairs reporting finalist)

David Marr, Peter McEvoy and Sally Virgoe, Media Watch, ABC TV, “Cash for Comment II and Professor Flint’s Fan Mail” (short current affairs reporting finalist)

Vivien Altman and Mark Corcoran, Foreign Correspondent, ABC TV, “War on Terror: The Yemen Option” (long Current Affairs, feature, doco or special finalist)

Sarah Curnow, Jonathan Holmes and Nick McKenzie, Four Corners, ABC TV, “Speed trap” (long Current Affairs, feature, doco or special finalist)

Tony Jones, Lateline, ABC TV, “Lateline Interviews” (broadcast interviewing finalists)

Mara Blazic, Belinda Hawkins and Angela Trabucco, Australian Story, ABC TV, “Of Woman Born (Parts 1 + 2)” (best use of the medium finalist)

Wendy Page, Mara Blazic and Angela Trabucco, Australian Story, ABC TV, “From this Day Forth” (social equity finalist)

Michael Cox, ABC TV, “American Hostage” (TV news camera finalist)

Louie Eroglu, Foreign Correspondent, ABC TV, “Marsh Arabs” (TV news camera finalist)

Channel Nine finalists:


National Nine News Queensland, National Nine News, Nine Network, “Hanson Release” (TV news reporting finalist)

Amanda Paterson and Lisa Ryan, A Current Affair, Nine Network, “Keith Lloyd” (short current affairs reporting finalist)

Sarah Ferguson, Sunday, Nine Network, “Willie Brigitte: The French connection” (international journalist finalist)
Sarah Ferguson, Sunday, Nine Network, “Face to face with the Bali bombers” (coverage of Asia-Pac region finalist)

Amanda Paterson and Lisa Ryan, A Current Affair, Nine Network, “Keith Lloyd” (investigative finalist)

SBS TV finalists:


Chris Hilton, SBS TV, Hilton Cordell Productions, “Dying to Leave” (long Current Affairs, feature, doco or special finalist)

Bentley Dean, Oslen Levy/SBS, “The President versus David Hicks” (international journalist finalist)

Carmela Baranowska, Dateline, SBS TV, “Taliban country” (coverage of Asia-Pac region finalist)

Mark Davis, Dateline, SBS TV, “Ruddock/Musharraf/Mahathir” (broadcast interviewing finalists)

Channel Seven finalists:


Brad Cramer and Tim Stockton,


Seven News, Seven Network, “Redfern Riots” (TV news camera finalists)

Reader feedback:
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Walkley feedback – how does McGeough get nominated?

A Fairfax watcher writes:

Paul McGeough has a long and successful career, but how can he be nominated for a Walkley this year after one of the worst, most inaccurate “world exclusives” in Australian journalistic history?

Has everyone just forgotten that Paul wrote earlier this year that “Iyad Allawi, the new Prime Minister of Iraq, pulled a pistol and executed as many as six suspected insurgents at a Baghdad police station, just days before Washington handed control of the country to his interim government”. Check it out here.

Not a shred of evidence has ever surfaced, and only the ABC followed up on the story (of course). The SMH just let the story quietly sink into the mire. Alan Ramsey probably still thinks it was John Howard, not Allawi, who did the shooting.

And now McGeough is nominated for a Walkley for his reporting on Iraq. These awards are such a joke.

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Modest Madonna

I read the list you provided re Walkley Award winners and was interested to see the finals judging list say: Madonna King, visiting fellow in journalism, QUT

Hmmm, why isn’t Madonna King fessing up to be a columnist at The Courier-Mail? Not glamorous enough?

The Banana Bender

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Check out the full list and send us your thoughts on who should win and who was unluckly not to make the shortlist to boss@ crikey.com.au.