The Times was last night named newspaper of the year at the Press Awards.
In recent months it has been the only national newspaper in the country to grow sales year on year.
Editor John Witherow said: “It shows that for some people paywalls can work, that newspaper sales can go up even in the very tough market we find ourselves in and the only we you can do that is if you have a brilliant team of journalists as we have at The Times.
The judges praised its “searing investigation” into the Rotherham sex abuse scandal.
The Times reporter who worked on that story, Andrew Norfolk, received the Cudlipp Award for outstanding popular journalism.
He said: “Cudlipp campaigned for the underdog. I hope he would have felt that Rotherham was a tale that needed telling.”
Norfolk was also named reporter of the year.
The Georgina Henry prize for innovation (open only to female journalists) went to Laura Bates of the website Everyday Sexism.
Scoop of the year went to The Mail on Sunday for "62p an hour" the story revealing the low pay and poor working conditions of women who were making the "This is What A Feminist Looks Like" T-shirts.
The 31 awards were presented at the Marriott Grosvenor Square Hotel in central London last night.
Organised by the Society of Editors, the Press Awards recognise national newspaper journalism.
Full list of winners:
Young Journalist
Winner: Peter Campbell – Daily Mail
Business and Finance Journalist
Winner: Simon Goodley – The Guardian
Highly commended: Ambrose Evans-Pritchard – The Daily Telegraph
Political Journalist
Winner: Matthew Parris – The Times
Highly commended: Janan Ganesh – Financial Times
Foreign Reporter
Winner: Patrick Cockburn – The Independent and i
Highly commended: Anthony Loyd – The Times
Science and Health Journalist
Winner: Andrew Gregory – Daily Mirror
Highly commended: Steve Connor – The Independent and i
Showbiz Reporter
Winner: Halina Watts – Daily Mirror
Highly commended: Simon Cable – Freelance (Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, The Mail on Sunday) and Richard Brooks – The Sunday Times
Sports Journalist
Winner: Matt Lawton – Daily Mail
Highly commended: Ian Herbert – The Independent and i
Specialist Journalist
Winner: Pilita Clark – Financial Times
Highly commended: Dan Hyde -The Daily Telegraph
Interviewer of the Year (Pop)
Winner: Rebecca Hardy – Daily Mail
Highly commended: Frances Hardy – Daily Mail
Interviewer of the Year (Broadsheet)
Winner: Bryan Appleyard – The Sunday Times
Highly commended: Simon Hattenstone – The Guardian
Feature Writer (Pop)
Winner: Tom Parry – Daily Mirror
Highly commended: Joshi Herrmann – London Evening Standard
Feature Writer (Broadsheet)
Winner: Anthony Loyd – The Times
Highly commended: Patrick Strudwick – The Independent and i
Columnist (Pop)
Winner: Quentin Letts – Daily Mail
Highly commended: Brian Reade – Daily Mirror
Columnist of the Year (Broadsheet)
Mark Steel – The Independent and i
Highly commended: Fraser Nelson – The Daily Telegraph and Howard Jacobson -The Independent
Critic
Winner: David Sexton – London Evening Standard
Highly commended: Michael Deacon – The Daily Telegraph
Photographer
Winner: Rowan Griffiths -Daily Mirror
Highly commended: Ben Birchall – Press Association and Stefan Rousseau – Press Association
Sports Photographer
Winner: Marc Aspland – The Times
Highly commended: Martin Rickett – Press Association
Cartoonist
Winner: Peter Brookes – The Times
Highly commended: Matt Pritchett – The Daily Telegraph
Scoop
Winner: "62p an hour", Ben Ellery, The Mail on Sunday
Highly commended: "Boxing legend Frank: I'm now a woman", Matthew Drake, Sunday Mirror and "Fifa Files: Plot to buy the World Cup", Insight, The Sunday Times
News Reporter
Winner: Andrew Norfolk – The Times
Highly commended: Insight – The Sunday Times and Ben Ellery – The Mail on Sunday
The Digital Award
Winner: Daily Mirror
Highly commended: The Guardian
Front Page
Winner: "Here is the news, not the propaganda" – The Independent on Sunday
Highly commended: "62p an hour" – The Mail on Sunday and "The Vow" – Daily Record
Supplement
Winner: The Times Magazine
Highly commended: Notebook – Sunday Mirror
Business Team
Winner: Financial Times
Highly commended: The Times
Sports Team
Winner: Daily Record
Highly commended: Mail Sport
News Team
Winner: The Sunday Times
Highly commended: Sunday People
The Cudlipp Award
Winner: "My Battle for the Lost Girls of Rotherham" – The Times
Highly commended: "Kids in Crisis" – Daily Mirror
The Journalists' Charity Award
Winner: Matt Pritchett – The Daily Telegraph
The Georgina Henry Women in Journalism Prize for Innovation
Winner: Laura Bates – Everyday Sexism
Highly commended: Iram Ramzan -Interactive blog for moderate Muslim voices
Chairman's Award
Winner: Jonathan Grun, emeritus editor, Press Association
Newspaper of the Year
Winner: The Times
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