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Page 94: the Private Eye Podcast.

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Hello, and welcome to
another episode of Page 94.

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This is an extremely exciting one.

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Behind me there are dozens, maybe
hundreds, of brilliant journalists,

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of whom six have been shortlisted
for this year's Paul Foot Award,

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in memory of the late, great
campaigning journalist, Paul Foot.

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We're about to find out which of
those journalists has won this

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year's award, so without further ado,
over to the magazine's editor, Ian

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Hislop

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it, it's

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been a very, very bizarre year,
and journalism must feel this.

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The implosion of the Labour Party, war in
the Middle East, the rise of right-wing

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parties, a toxic split, um, in the
British public, and an economic crisis.

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Looking

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back

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at the stuff

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Paul wrote for Private Eye,
I coped with all of this.

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None of it would've surprised him.

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And the important thing about Paul
is that he would not have despaired.

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Um, particularly not about journalism.

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Paul was, um, for those
who don't really know

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and

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imagine he was writing about Boer War,

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um,

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uh, he, uh, worked for a long time for
the Daily Mirror and for Private Eye, and

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the first thing I did when I was editor
was, um, get him back, um, on the team.

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He was a great friend of Richard
Ingrams, um, and, uh, Christopher Booker.

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They were at s- all at and they
were that early Private Eye team.

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What Paul b- um, brought was

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the focus on journalism.

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Uh, if much he wrote, uh, about Lockerbie,
for example, um, the, uh, uh, um, air

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crash and then the, um, the, the fake
terrorism story and the consequent

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fallout.

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The infected

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blood scandal,

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Paul wrote about that.

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There's yet another, uh,
review of it last week.

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None of this goes away.

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Miscarriages.

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Um, I

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w- was reading his,
report, the arms to Iraq.

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Would you believe it?

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Britain was exporting arms to
a Middle East country and not

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admitting it.

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Certainly wouldn't happen now.

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Um, uh, Jonathan Aitken, um,
campaign against him, um, uh,

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again, which ended with a win.

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sword of justice was blunted, um, and, uh,

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Aitken, um,

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had to,

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um, apologize, give up, and

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then he went to jail.

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Um, the great thing

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about Paul, though, took

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all this stuff incredibly

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seriously,

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but he wanted journalism
to be fun and for it to be

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enjoyable and life-enhancing.

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And I

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remember with Jonathan Aitken,
we were… He'd sued us.

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We were

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in serious trouble.

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and I said, "I'm thinking of
putting in a fake apology."

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Paul thought was funny and said,

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"
Why don't you put it in?"

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We did put it in.

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Jonathan Aitken didn't think it was funny.

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Uh, he renewed a claim for exemplary

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damages,

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which he may well have got.

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I don't remember the

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end of the

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story.

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Um,

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the

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point of

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the

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the

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point

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of the story, um,

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i-

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is

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that,

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uh, the great thing
about Paul, and it's the

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reason the prize is named after him,
is he was passionate about journalism,

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but he wanted it to be entertaining,
and he knew that to get people to read

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a story, particularly a story of any
length, it had to be entertaining,

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accessible,

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um, and worth reading.

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And Paul, he could make you sad,
he could make you furious, he could

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make make you care, quite difficult,
um, nowadays, and particularly

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when he was presenting

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his stuff to me.

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So what

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I'm going to

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do is announce the winner, invite them
to come up and get their check, and then

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invite all of the

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people on the shortlist.

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So this is the moment.

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The Pulitzter Awards 2026 goes
to Peter Geoghegan and Kadifa

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Shariff

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So here we are with the winner of this
year's Paul Foot Award, Peter Geoghegan.

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Congratulations, Peter.

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Thank you very much, Andy.

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Uh, would you like to
thank, uh, God, the Academy?

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I'd

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like to thank, you know…

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Well, I w- I'd like to thank all
the wonderful people I worked

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with to tell these stories.

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First and foremost, someone who's not
here, which is Khadija Sharief, who was

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my coauthor with so many of these pieces.

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If it wasn't for Khadija, this story
wouldn't, it would never have been told,

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and certainly not in the way it was told.

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So that was absolutely

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couldn't have happened

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otherwise.

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And obviously, a huge thanks to
everybody at Private Eye and all

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the judges and everybody else
who took the time to go through

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a story like

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that, who also listened
to a contribution from…

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You know, we're a newsletter.

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You know, we're a small website.

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There's only three of us.

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To

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be able

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to punch at the same level as
some of these incredible stories

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is just, yeah, it's phenomenal.

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Yeah.

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Um, nothing for Keir Starmer
in your thanks, without whom?

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Well, maybe a

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small thanks to Josh Simons, without

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whom we wouldn't be, you

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know…

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I wouldn't be standing

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here.

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The voters of Makerfield
wouldn't be going to the

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polls in a couple of weeks' time.

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So

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maybe it's all down to Josh.

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Maybe.

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Maybe.

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Now, the other thing we should say, which
we didn't say when we first interviewed

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you, this is not your first time on
the shortlist for the Paul Foot Award.

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It's time number…

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It's-

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It's time number three.

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Time number

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three.

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So

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I was… Yeah, I, I think I'm…

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My experience of the Paul Foot
Awards is a good example of,

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you know,

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fail and fail better, uh,

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as, as

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my compatriot Samuel Beckett once

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said.

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Uh, back in, I think, 2018, maybe
2019, myself and my colleague

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Jenna Corduroy were longlisted for

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an investigation we did into Arron

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Banks.

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Whatever happened to him?

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Oh, actually, yes.

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Yeah,

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you know, who

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would have known?

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Um, and a few years later, we were
shortlisted, myself and Jenna and

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Lucas Amey were shortlisted for an

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investigation into the Cabinet Office's
Freedom of Information clearing house,

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how they were… You might remember that
story, how they were suppressing FOIs

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from journalists, campaigners and others.

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Yeah.

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And also that year, I

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was also

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shortlisted for the Guardian

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as part of their investigations I've been
doing with them into COVID corruption and

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PPE lanes, as people might remember as

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well, so.

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Your fourth time on the shortlist, really.

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Yeah, so fourth

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time lucky.

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There we go.

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This shows the po- importance
of perseverance in journalism.

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Yeah, yeah.

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Well, congratulations again, Peter.

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It's a terrific

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story.

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We'll find out the results
very soon in a wider sense.

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Yeah.

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Thank you very much, Andy.

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Thank you.

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Okay.

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That's it for this year's Paul Foot Award.

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We'll be back in a year with another
one, and we'll be back tomorrow

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with another regular episode of the

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Private

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Eye podcast, recorded
from the Hay Festival.

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Bye

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for now.