The Guardian’s Daniel Taylor has won both the news reporter and sports journalist of the year awards for his series of stories about child sexual abuse in football.
His interview with Andy Woodward, who revealed he had been abused as a young footballer at Crewe Alexandra, was the first in a series that exposed a previously hidden scandal.
The judges of the Press Awards, organised by the Society of Editors, said Taylor produced “a fantastic series of stories, the repercussions of which will be felt for many years” and described his work as “agenda-setting, sensitive and unequivocally in the public interest”.
“While his interview with Andy Woodward was an outstanding piece of reporting, his follow-ups and the aftermath of the revelations have been just as important. Quite simply, his work dominated the news agenda both in print, on television and online,” they added.
Amelia Gentleman of the Guardian won the specialist journalist of the year award for her powerful reporting about the child refugees in Calais failed by Britain, migrant crisis, and features for which she obtained unprecedented access to prisons such as Wandsworth – Britain’s most overcrowded jail.
The judges said she produced “compellingly told stories about the big social issues of the day”.
The awards were presented at a ceremony at the Hilton hotel on Park Lane in central London on Wednesday night.
The Guardian’s G2 section was highly commended in the supplement of the year category, which was won by the Financial Times Weekend magazine.
George Monbiot was highly commended in the environment journalist of the year category. The award was taken by the Financial Times reporter Pilita Clark.
The late AA Gill won two trophies: feature writer and columnist of the year.
The writer and provocative television and restaurant critic for the Sunday Times died in December aged 62, less than a month after revealing he was seriously ill with cancer.
Gill’s decision to tell readers that he had an “embarrassment of cancer – the full English” and relate his experiences of being treated in the NHS – a cover story for the Sunday Times magazine in December – helped him clinch the feature writing award.
The Daily Mail took newspaper of the year, while the Financial Times picked up the website of the year award.
The chairman’s award went to the New European, launched in the wake of the Brexit referendum vote. The judges called the paper “an unusual success – the counter-intuitive story of a new print launch in a digital age”.
