Other voices, other reforms

I was honoured to be invited to judge nominees for the Magazine Feature Writing category of the Walkley Awards for 2006. It was an awesome task in the true sense of the word - 59 submissions of an exceptionally high standard, ranging in subject from elegant profiles of public identities to gut-wrenching pieces of investigative journalism. (Indeed, there were so many well-written profiles, one of the judges suggested this genre should have its own category.) Reading and assessing was a pretty tough ask but we (my fellow judges Toby Creswell and Louise Adler) came to a conclusion surprisingly quickly. Congratulations to Patrick Cook, Chloe Hooper and Amanda Hooton who are our chosen finalists in the category. Of course, there were at least another five stories I would have loved to have given a gong, but that's the cruel nature of writing awards. I toodled along to the Civic Hotel in central Sydney on Wednesday night for the ceremony to anounce nominees. In a particularly unfortunate stroke of irony, this was the same week that our beloved Communications Minister, behaving increasingly like Miss Piggy, drove the new media reforms through the Senate. Not a great week for journalism or freedom of speech, when you add Anna Politkovskaya's murder into the mix. Still, talking the Pollyanna line, I was heartened by the fact that there are so many talented voices being published. Let's just hope there will always be a significant medium for them to be heard. The winners of the Walkley Awards will be announced in a televised gala event on November 30 in Melbourne.