Media Releases

Radio New Zealand Dominates News Awards

Released at 9:23 am on 11 May 2012

Radio New Zealand dominated the news categories when the 2012 New Zealand Radio Awards were announced this evening.

Radio New Zealand won the major news categories including Best Coverage of a News Story for its Christchurch earthquake coverage.

See a list of Radio New Zealand award winners.

Two news journalists were recognised with individual awards. Jessica Maddock was voted Individual Journalist of the Year and Bridget Mills was Best New Journalist. The news documentary programme Insight also received an award.

In total, Radio New Zealand won eleven awards in ten different categories.

Radio New Zealand won all Spoken Programme categories and winners included Saturday Morning with Kim Hill, This Way Up, Ruth Beran, and Duncan Smith. In Best New Zealand Music and Outside Broadcast technical categories Radio New Zealand Concert dominated with Robbie Ellis taking two awards and Adrian Hollay one.

The award announcements come just after a consumer report by international market research company Nielsen confirmed that Radio New Zealand National was the top ranking radio station in New Zealand in 2011 with a market share of 11.1%.

Radio New Zealand's success at the 2012 Radio Awards highlights its strong performance over the past 12 months as the only independent and commercial-free public service broadcaster in the New Zealand.

New Zealand has more radio stations per head of population than almost anywhere in the world with more than 250 stations competing for a live listening audience.

Entries for the New Zealand Radio Awards are open to all commercial and noncommercial stations.