Award-winning British journalist and writer (born 1953)
Nicholas Davies
(born 28 March 1953
[
citation needed
]
) is a British
investigative journalist
, writer, and
documentary
maker.
Davies has written extensively as a
freelancer
, as well as for
The Guardian
and
The Observer
, and been named Reporter of the Year,
[5]
Journalist of the Year and Feature Writer of the Year at the
British Press Awards
.
[6]
Davies has made documentaries for
ITV
's
World in Action
[
citation needed
]
and written numerous books on the subject of politics and journalism, including
Flat Earth News
,
[3]
which attracted considerable controversy as an expose of journalistic malpractice in the UK and around the globe.
[7]
As a reporter for
The Guardian
, Davies was responsible for uncovering the
News of the World
phone hacking scandal
, including the July 2011 revelations of hacking into the mobile phone voicemail of the murdered schoolgirl
Milly Dowler
.
Career in journalism
[
edit
]
Davies gained a
PPE
degree from
Oxford University
in 1974,
[8]
and started his journalism career in 1976, working as a trainee for the
Mirror Group
in
Plymouth
. He then moved to London initially to work for the
Sunday People
and spent a year working for
The Evening Standard
before becoming a news reporter at
The Guardian
in July 1979. Since then he has worked as
home affairs
correspondent at
The Observer
; chief feature writer at
London Daily News
in 1986 and on-screen reporter for
World in Action
and
Channel 4
's
Dispatches
. After the
London Daily News
folded he moved to the United States for a year, where he wrote
White Lies
, about the wrongful conviction of a black janitor,
Clarence Brandley
, for the murder of a white girl.
[8]
From 1989 Davies was a freelance reporter for
The Guardian
, for which he contributed articles,
[9]
working from his home in Sussex. He was the winner of the first
Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism
in 1999.
[10]
In September 2016 he retired, announcing that he would travel in search of interesting experiences. His website states he was last seen somewhere between a yoga shala in Indonesia and a cattle ranch in northern Argentina.
Following the publication of
Flat Earth News
and a
Guardian
story co-written by Davies claiming that
News of the World
journalists tapped private mobile phones
to get stories,
[11]
on 14 July 2009 Davies told the
Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee
that the
Metropolitan Police Service
had done too little to investigate the claims.
[12]
The
Guardian
coverage also led to calls from high-profile MPs for the dismissal of
Andy Coulson
, communications director for the
Conservative Party
.
[13]
Davies received the
Paul Foot Award
2011 for his work on this story.
[14]
Davies's book on the
News International
phone hacking scandal
,
Hack Attack: How the Truth Caught Up with Rupert Murdoch
, was released in August 2014.
[4]
[15]
Critical reaction to
Flat Earth News
[
edit
]
Flat Earth News
was greeted in the
London Review of Books
on its publication as "a genuinely important book, one which is likely to change, permanently, the way anyone who reads it looks at the British newspaper industry".
[16]
The
LRB
highlighted the analysis showing that 60% of the content of UK papers was based mainly on
wire copy
or press releases, a practice Davies called "
churnalism
", while only 12% are original stories and only 12% of stories showed evidence that the central statement had been corroborated.
Mary Riddell
in
The Observer
disputed some of the charges against British journalism in the book, and described it as "unduly pessimistic".
[17]
Peter Oborne
in
The Spectator
concentrated on the use of illegal techniques to invade privacy rather than declining standards, describing
Flat Earth News
as "hypnotically readable" and praising the collection of evidence that the practice of journalism is "bent", although qualifying this somewhat by suggesting that Davies "ignores a great deal [of journalism] that is salient and good".
[18]
Awards
[
edit
]
Bibliography
[
edit
]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
Davies, Nick (1997).
Dark heart: the shocking truth about hidden Britain
. London: Chatto & Windus.
ISBN
978-0-7011-6351-8
.
- ^
Davies, Nick (2000).
The school report: why Britain's schools are failing
. London: Vintage.
ISBN
978-0-09-942216-7
.
- ^
a
b
Davies, Nicholas (2008).
Flat Earth News: An Award-winning Reporter Exposes Falsehood, Distortion and Propaganda in the Global Media
. London: Chatto & Windus.
ISBN
978-0-7011-8145-1
.
- ^
a
b
Davies, Nick (2014).
Hack attack: the inside story of how the truth caught up with Rupert Murdoch
(First American ed.). New York: Faber & Faber, an affiliate of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
ISBN
978-0-86547-881-7
.
- ^
a
b
"British Press Awards: Past winners"
.
Press Gazette
. Archived from
the original
on 20 March 2012
. Retrieved
20 August
2009
.
- ^
a
b
"The 7.30 Report ? Media industry in crisis as standards decline: Davies"
.
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
. 27 August 2008
. Retrieved
20 August
2009
.
- ^
"Author Details for Nick Davies"
.
Random House
. Retrieved
20 August
2009
.
- ^
a
b
Bell, Matthew (12 July 2009).
"A burning indignation towards people who abuse power"
.
The Independent
. London.
Archived
from the original on 20 June 2022.
- ^
Davies, Nick
(2008).
Flat Earth News
. UK:
Vintage Books
. p. 3.
ISBN
978-0-7011-8145-1
.
- ^
a
b
"The Martha Gellhorn Prize previous winners"
.
Martha Gellhorn Prize
. Retrieved
20 August
2009
.
- ^
"News of the World 'bugging' claim"
.
BBC News
. 8 July 2009
. Retrieved
28 September
2009
.
- ^
"Paper accused of phone 'cover-up'
"
.
BBC News
. 14 July 2009
. Retrieved
28 September
2009
.
- ^
Davies, Caroline (9 July 2009).
"David Cameron urged to sack Tory spin doctor Andy Coulson"
.
The Guardian
. London
. Retrieved
29 September
2009
.
- ^
a
b
Sabbagh, Dan (29 February 2012).
"Nick Davies wins award for hacking expose"
.
The Guardian
. p. 5.
- ^
Porter, Henry
(3 August 2014).
"Hack Attack review ? Nick Davies's gripping account of the hacking affair"
.
The Guardian
. Retrieved
4 September
2014
.
- ^
Lanchester, John
(6 March 2008).
"Riots, Terrorism etc"
.
London Review of Books
.
30
(5): 3.
- ^
Riddell, Mary (3 February 2008).
"Failures of the Fourth Estate"
.
The New York Observer
. London
. Retrieved
29 September
2009
.
- ^
Oborne, Peter (30 January 2008).
"The vile behaviour of the press"
.
The Spectator
. Archived from
the original
on 25 September 2009
. Retrieved
29 September
2009
.
External links
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