When the Walkley board walks

Journalists often diss the idea of winning a Walkley - until they win one. With a silver (or even better, a gold) quill tucked safely under arm, journalists are more than ready to acknowledge that having one is a prestigious accolade and affirmation by your peers that your work is more than merely good, but an exemplar of how ethical, impactful journalism ought to be done. But the Walkley Foundation which administers the prizes has been in turmoil and indeed become news itself. And more than a few journalists are questioning what impact the turmoil and its resolution will have on the prestige associated with winning an award still regarded as the greatest of gongs for Aussie hacks.

Back in 1956 when the Walkley Awards were created, they were administered by the then journalist’s union, the Australian Journalists Association. In 1992, the AJA amalgamated with two other unions to become the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance – the MEAA. The MEAA was the custodian of the award until 2000, when it established the Walkley Foundation to manage the peer-reviewed awards.

The MEAA was, and remains, represented on the Foundation board, but recently concern was raised that the union was exercising excessive control over it and the distribution of prizes. That concern was spearheaded by three journalists on the Foundation board – Victoria Laurie, Sally Neighbour and Adele Ferguson - who resigned when the MEAA rejected their push for more independent board members to ensure good governance. In effect, the then board members wanted an amendment to the Foundation’s constitution to ensure a majority of board members were independent of the MEAA. The change wouldn’t have affected the three MEAA-appointed board directors.

Now the foundation has appointed four new board members and will operate without a chair. The decision has been criticised as leaving the Walkley Foundation union dominated. And why would that be a problem? The Sydney Morning Herald reported in December 2025: ‘There have been suggestions the internal battle has arisen due to the union’s increasing tendency to take positions on contested matters, albeit those that are largely supported among its membership.’

Those positions included the MEAA passing a resolution calling for ethical reporting about the Israel-Gaza conflict in late 2023, based on a petition it supported, which was signed by hundreds of journalists and media workers. The response of some mainstream news media editors to their journalists signing that petition was swift – ranging from ‘best not to sign petitions’ to ‘you’ve ruled yourself out of covering this conflict’. More broadly, it raised interesting questions around what impartiality as a characteristic of good journalism means in the midst of a conflict in which the huge death toll of Palestinian civilians looks very deliberate.

If indeed the MEAA’s backing of the petition was a factor in the renegade Walkley Foundation directors’ 2025 decision to walk, that means three of the finest journalists this country has produced think differently to the union about what good journalism looks like. It's easy to see how a particular view of what good journalism is could skew the awarding of Walkleys to some and not others.