THE Australian has dominated the inaugural News Awards, scoring 12 finalist spots in eight of 13 categories, from feature writing and business journalism to photography and cartooning.

This includes being one of the four finalists, from a national field of 36, for the Best Newspaper of the Year award.

News Limited chairman and chief executive John Hartigan said yesterday he hoped to create awards that would recognise the best journalists and photographers in the country.

He said while the better-known Walkley Awards had a rich history, the fact News Limited was the biggest employer of journalists inthe country was often held against it at the Walkleys.

“But we have the best people and we should recognise and reward them,” he said. “Hopefully the News Awards will become the pre- eminent awards in the country.

“The News Awards are judged by the journalists’ peers and I think it is a fairer system, rather than some of the social justice representatives the Walkleys have had in the past.”

The Australian‘s finalists include Cameron Stewart, nominated for the Sir Keith Murdoch Award for Journalism for a range of investigative pieces, including the story of convicted terrorist Jack Roche and the rise and fall of Labor leader Mark Latham.

Two of the three finalists for Business Journalist of the Year came from The Australian. Communications writer Michael Sainsbury led the national coverage of Telstra, revealing how closely the business was entwined with its political ownership. And Richard Gluyas’s scoop “NAB cuts 4000 jobs in global shake-up” was published the day before the bank’s interim profit was announced.

Matt Price was nominated in the Specialist Writer of the Year segment for his Sketch column. Mr Hartigan said it was “an often whimsical, occasionally serious, look at politics which nevertheless still manages to break stories”.

Indonesian correspondent Sian Powell, a Specialist Writer finalist, was also nominated for Features Journalist of the Year for her reporting on issues ranging from the Boxing Day tsunami to the trial of Schapelle Corby.

Mike Safe from The Weekend Australian Magazine was a finalist in the same category for a range of work that included the trauma felt by the families of hit-and-run victims and a dramatic reconstruction of the execution-style killing of a psychiatrist.

Ian Gunn is a finalist for Sub-Editor of the Year for his headlines, including one on a story about the farcical attempts by two Greek athletes to avoid a drugs test before withdrawing from the Olympics with “Greek heroes exit stage, wearing scandals”.

Renee Nowytarger was nominated for Photographer of the Year for her images from Aceh after the tsunami and a warts-and-all portrait of actor Max Cullen. Cartoonist Peter Nicholson and News Limited’s Eric Lobbecke, whose work appears in The Australian, were named as Artist finalists.

Along with The Cairns Post, the Herald Sun and The Courier Mail, The Australian was nominated as a finalist for The Newspaper ofthe Year. The winners will be announced at a black tie dinner in Adelaide on November 15.

Other journalists from The Australian shortlisted for the Sir Keith Murdoch Award were Jeremy Roberts and Michelle Wiese-Bockmann for revealing the first extracts in the Palmer report on illegal detention, Tony Koch for articles on indigenous and other issues, and Ean Higgins and Brad Norington for revealing the drink-driving of then NSW Supreme Court judge Jeff Shaw.

Those short-listed in other categories were Elizabeth Colman (young journalist), Blair Speedy (business), Greg Denham (sport), Leigh Dayton (specialist), Martin Chulov (specialist), Kimina Lyall (specialist), Seumas Phelan (sub-editing), James Croucher (photography), Andrew Bunting (design) and Jason Bitneris (design).