Sling and Stone, Urbaine and Agent99 took out the Agency Awards at last week’s Golden Campaign Awards, while One LION won Corporate Team of the Year, TasWater was awarded Government Team of the Year and Alice and Clare Collins were NFP Team of the Year. The mother and daughter team were the night’s big winners, with Alice Collins also winning NFP Professional of the Year, Clare Collins taking Silver for NFP Leader of the Year and their Asbestos Awareness Month campaign winning Gold for NFP Campaign. Campaign Awards CHANGE COMMUNICATIONS CAMPAIGN GOLD: Your Service Matters: Introducing the SA Portable Long Service Leave Scheme – Community Services – Hughes BRONZE: Let's Go Green Ipswich! – The LKB Agency COMMUNITY RELATIONS AND ENGAGEMENT CAMPAIGN GOLD: Transforming PFAS communication with Indigenous communities – True North Strategic Communication SILVER: Me-Mel (Goat Island) Transfer Project – Primary Comms Group BRONZE: Meet the Buyer. One room. One day. – Bu

Alex Zaharov-Reutt is fronting a new tech TV show, The Byte Back, aimed at consumers, with the host speaking to a range of guests about the latest business, consumer and enterprise topics. "I'm trying to appeal to everybody," Zaharov-Reutt told Influencing. "We're doing deep dives where we can, but then asking guests to explain certain jargon they've used, because the audience might not understand." The show is a weekly one-hour live broadcast on UK-based UK Live across the weekend, with two episodes published so far. Guests on those episodes have included AI keynote speaker Dan Södergren, Red Oxygen's Brett Levy, O Marketing founder Rose Ross and Telsyte's Foad Fadaghi. Zaharov-Reutt said the opportunity came together only recently. “About a month and a half ago, I got a message from the producer of one of the shows that no longer exists on the TNT Network, and she said, I'm part of this Mike Graham network. And we'd love to invite you on and talk about AI, robots and techn

NSW domestic violence killings put safety failures back in the spotlight A string of alleged domestic-violence-related killings across NSW — including a decapitation case near Tenterfield — has triggered renewed political pressure for tougher prevention, policing and victim-support measures. The scale and speed of the incidents has sharpened scrutiny of how quickly authorities can intervene when risk escalates, and whether current settings are deterring repeat violence. Covered by: Daily Telegraph, Sydney Morning Herald. Blue Mountains stabbing shocks NSW amid broader weekend violence A preschool-aged child has been killed and two other young children and a woman critically injured in a stabbing in the Blue Mountains, a case that has reverberated nationally because of its brutality and the ages of the victims. The report situates the attack within a wider weekend spike in domestic-violence-linked deaths, intensifying calls for earlier intervention and better protection for famil

  Uttar Pradesh Police have registered a case against journalist Nikhat Ali and five other social media users over posts they allege misrepresented an Allahabad High Court hearing involving a Hindu man who converted to Islam and a subsequent dispute with his family. The FIR was filed on September 16 at Kotwali Shamli police station. It names Ali's X account, @INikhatAli, along with accounts identified as Karishma Aziz, The Muslim, Wasim Akram Tyagi, Syed Kaif Hasan and Nadeem Saifi. Police invoked Section 353(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which concerns the circulation of information alleged to cause public alarm or affect public tranquillity. According to the FIR, the accused claimed that the Allahabad High Court had reprimanded Shamli Police during proceedings involving 31-year-old Ayush Malik, a characterisation police say distorted the proceedings. The FIR does not reproduce the specific posts attributed to Ali or the other named accounts; it records police's own interpr

Friday, 18 September 2026 #1  ·  Times Nation  ·  Data story Kunbi (OBC) certs in Marathwada soared from 652 to 3.1L in 3 years By Priyanka Kakodkar   ·   The Times of India, New Delhi  ·  Page Page 20 Official data reveals Kunbi caste certificates issued to Marathas in Marathwada surged from 652 to 3.1 lakh between October 2023 and September 2026 — a dramatic jump against only 652 issued in the preceding 40 years. The story provides granular state-wide data showing 58.7 lakh records collated by the Shinde committee, with a rejection rate of just 0.4% across 14.4 lakh applicants. The piece contextualises the data within Manoj Jarange's three-year agitation and historical inequities between Marathwada and other Maharashtra regions. Rare data-driven accountability story that uses official committee figures to show a concrete, measurable outcome of a prolonged political agitation — the contrast betw

IMF warns of more rate hikes as pressure mounts on Chalmers to rein in spending A cluster of front pages leads with warnings that households could face up to three more interest-rate rises — and a higher recession risk — as the IMF urges governments to curb spending and lift productivity. Politically, it sharpens the cost-of-living contest by framing fiscal restraint and tax reform as urgent, not optional, and puts Treasurer Jim Chalmers squarely in the firing line. Covered by: Daily Telegraph, Herald Sun, Courier Mail, The Advertiser, The Australian. Labor’s migration crackdown: backpacker ballot, student limits and tougher deportations Labor is pitching a major migration reset that tightens international student pathways, clamps down on “visa hopping”, and introduces a lottery-style ballot for backpackers to help drive net overseas migration down toward target. The significance is twofold: it’s a direct response to housing and infrastructure strain, and it signals Labo

Get your pitches or story plans in as early as possible, says NZ Herald lifestyle managing editor Jasper Fulcher. Fulcher shared this on Influencing Insider yesterday, while outlining what he sees as the most important aspects of a story. “I think there are two parts to it. There's the commissioning part, and then we're looking for a way that it has cut through. I think at that point you need to be having that conversation about publishing and how holistically you can make that story work. “If you can have all those conversations and get all the pieces of the puzzle in place as early as possible, that's when you get the really good product at the end”.  He also later noted that PRs wanting to pitch for the publication’s weekend edition should do it as soon as possible, like a Monday, for example, as then the editorial team can turn it around potentially.  Fulcher listed two ways PRs could help him create stronger content. “Understanding how our platforms work….Hav