Camden New Journal - News: New Journal reporter’s abuse exposé honoured at annual Paul Foot award

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Camden New Journal - by JOHN GULLIVER
Published: 18th October 2007

New Journal reported Paul Keilthy with Ian Hislop

New Journal reporter’s abuse exposé honoured at annual Paul Foot award

‘We are here as the feral end of the media. Everyone here is an investigator or campaigner doing what Footie would have wanted’

AN investigation into the council abuses of the elderly by a Camden New Journal reporter was recognised in a prestigious award ceremony on Monday.
Paul Keilthy’s nine-month probe into the sell-off of a 92-year-old’s possessions was runner-up in the Paul Foot Award for campaigning journalism.
It forced Camden to set up an investigation by its internal audit team and has introduced safeguards to reduce the risk of theft and measures to locate next of kin.
Private Eye editor Ian Hislop, one of seven judges, said: “It was a really good, spontaneous local investigation. This year we have had more entries than ever and the quality is higher than ever.
“We are here as the feral end of the media. Everyone here is an investigator or campaigner doing what Footie would have wanted.
“Despite what everyone says about the dumbing down of British journalism, the Paul Foot award demonstrates that the investigative spirit of journalism is alive and flourishing throughout the British press.”
When Camden Council workers emptied the flat, including valuable books and antique furniture, of a 92-year-old woman who lay dying in a nursing home they thought that she had no next of kin. Paul Keilthy discovered that in fact she had recently been re-united with her grandson and that she lived within a mile of three nieces.
He found her antiques, including a Victorian commode, on sale in a nearby shop. He discovered that Camden Council cleared 1,200 homes every year and went on to uncover a racket in which workers on the teams emptying the houses were running an illicit industry selling the possessions of the aged or infirm who had been transferred to nursing homes or hospitals on E-Bay or in furniture shops.
The annual Paul Foot Award was set up in 2004 following the renowned journalist’s death. It celebrates investigative journalism in the style of Foot, who lived in West Hampstead.
The seven judges were Ian Hislop, Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger, former Daily Mirror editor Bill Hagerty, Paul Foot’s long-term partner Clare Fermont, NUJ General Secretary Jeremy Dear, Brian MacArthur and Foot’s oldest friend Richard Ingrams. An eighth judge – the legendary editor Richard Stott – died earlier this year.
The panel split this year’s £5000 first prize between David Leigh and Rob Evans of the Guardian for their investigation into the issue of bribery in the British arms trade and Deborah Wain of the Doncaster Free Press for her expose of corruption in the Doncaster Education City project.

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