Judges for the Sandford St Martin 2024 Awards
Sandford St Martin judges represent some of the best of the UK’s broadcasting and journalism industries. Chosen to represent a broad range of experience, perspectives and backgrounds as well as attitudes to faith, what they have in common is their skill, professionalism and commitment to excellence in broadcasting.
Remona Aly
Radio/Audio Judge
Remona Aly is a journalist, commentator and broadcaster with a focus on faith, lifestyle and identity. Remona writes for The Guardian and other media outlets and is a resident contributor to BBC Radio 2’s Pause for Thought on the Zoe Ball Breakfast show. She was a presenter on BBC Radio 4’s Something Understood and is a podcast presenter for various platforms, including the award-winning Things Unseen which centres on moral, spiritual and ethical issues.
Remona was previously deputy editor of emel – a vibrant and glossy British Muslim lifestyle magazine and she has been Director of Communications for Exploring Islam Foundation which specialises in dynamic PR campaigns and resources on Islam and Muslims across media platforms.
Heenan Bhatti
Young Audience Judge
Heenan Bhatti is a multi award-winning film-maker (BAFTA, Prix Europa, Rose D’Or, Royal Television Society, and Broadcast) and founder of ClockWork Films which made ‘Ramadan in Lockdown’ (Sandford St Martin Trustees’ Content Award Winner 2021) and ‘This Girl’s Changed’, (winner of the Sandford St Martin Young Audience Award in 2022). He has made prime time programming in all factual genres for a range of broadcasters including ‘The Great British School Swap’, ‘Make Bradford British’, ‘Paul Merton in India’, ‘Derren Brown Investigates’, ‘A Very British Wedding’, ‘The Real Gary Glitter’ and ‘The Lost Frescoes’.
Radzi Chinyanganya
Chair of Young Audience judging panel
Radzi Chinyanganya is a television presenter who started his presenting career on the BBC’s landmark children’s show, Blue Peter, and is now regularly seen on BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Amazon and TNT. He is one of TNT’S leading presenters, working across the Olympics, snooker and athletics, as well as being a regular host of Formula E.
Radzi also works across the factual and entertainment, presenting programmes such as Songs of Praise, Crufts and Good Morning Britain as well as appearing in entertainment shows such as Dancing on Ice, Beat The Chasers and Supermarket Sweep.
His debut book, Move Like a Lion, went to number one in the Amazon Bestseller’s list in early 2021, with Move Like A Cub and Radzi’s Incredible Facts released during 2023.
Tallulah Clark
Young Audience Judge
Tallulah Clark is an aspiring journalist and passionate disability activist. She has a disability called ataxia and is passionate about representation of minority groups and giving those that are misrepresented and unheard a voice.
Tallulah was part of BBC Future Voices, an intensive journalism training scheme providing an insight into life at the BBC and what it takes to be a journalist. She has also previously worked for the BBC World Service with BBC Mundo online as well as for their social platforms, striving to improve disability representation for audiences across Latin America.
Peter Curran
Chair of the Radio/Audio judging panel
Peter Curran is an award-winning radio and tv documentary maker, and regular Radio 4 presenter. He’s made programmes in the USA, Brazil, South Africa, and the Arctic Circle. Recent BBC Radio documentaries include: The Past is a Foreign Country, Spirit of the Midnight Sun, Litter from America, When Words Fail…Music Speaks. He co-hosts the celebrated comedy podcast Bunk Bed with writer/director Patrick Marber.
Osob Elmi
Journalism Judge
Osob Elmi is an award winning broadcast journalist at BBC News current affairs. With 7 years experience of working in regional, national and international newsrooms across the BBC, she has extensive experience producing a diverse range of work on TV, radio and online stories ranging from knife crime, child poverty, mental health and the Black Lives Matter movement. Osob Elmi has been a reporter on BBC Points West and in the BBC Nairobi Bureau. She currently produces work at BBC Verify, incorporating video verification, data analysis and social newsgathering.
Nick Hamer
TV/Video Judge
Nick Hamer is a documentary filmmaker with 20 years’ experience in the industry, and whose work has been screened by major broadcasters, international film festivals and independent cinemas. He is the director of Intrepid Media which won a Sandford St Martin 2022 Award for ‘Brotherhood: The Inner Life of Monks’. Nick has been nominated for a Royal Television Society Award and long listed for a British Independent Film Award for Best Documentary. He is a producer, director and cinematographer with broadcast credits from BBC, ITV, Sky, ARTE and CBC.
Vanessa Harriss
Young Audience Judge
Vanessa Harriss is the editor of the multi-award-winning weekly children’s news magazine, The Week Junior. Vanessa joined the team before the launch, in 2015, as production editor. Her job was to set the magazine’s tone of voice when addressing a young and curious audience. She has a deep understanding of TWJ’s readers: what interests them and what worries them – and that they view the world with a strong sense of justice. In a career of 25 years, she has worked for many newspapers and magazines but highlights include being copy chief at TIME (Europe, Middle East and Asia) and working at Wired UK, explaining complex technologies to a broad readership.
Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner
Radio/Audio Judge
Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner is a broadcaster, Executive Coach and rabbi at Bromley Synagogue. She is an accredited Integral Development Coach and is the former Senior Rabbi to Reform Judaism. Rabbi Laura is a regular broadcaster on BBC Radio 4’s Thought for the Day, and BBC One’s The Big Questions. Her most recent book is about resilience, Bitesize Resilience: A Crisis Survival Guide (May 2020) and Rabbi Laura also provides daily wisdom and practical strategies in her podcast.
Anna Magnusson
Radio/Audio Judge
Anna Magnusson is an award-winning radio producer and presenter, with extensive experience in radio production and broadcast, including over 20 years’ experience in BBC Scotland and 11 years as a freelance writer, broadcaster and producer. Over her career she worked across a wide range of radio areas and networks, from documentaries and features to live strands and arts programmes. Before leaving the BBC she was in charge of Religion and Ethics programming for BBC Radio Scotland. She’s the author of four books of non-fiction, and in 2012 she won the Sandford St Martin Radio Award.
She is a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4’s Prayer for the Day, and continues to present and write features for radio.
Tommy Nagra
Chair of the TV/Video judging panel
Tommy Nagra is an award-winning programme maker and creative leader who is currently the Director of Content for BBC Children In Need.
He has worked across the BBC and Independent sector across many departments including BBC Religion & Ethics where he oversaw production teams making a range of programmes from documentary, features and worship programming through to Live Events for all BBC Channels, covering all faiths.
He has gained several industry accolades including Mentor of The Year at The Cultural Diversity Network Awards and Outstanding Contribution to Media at the Asian Media Awards in 2018. He currently sits on the Royal Television Society Committee in the North West, as well as the Advisory Board for Creative Access, a social enterprise dedicated to recruiting under-represented talent in the creative industries.
Juliet Riddell
TV/Video judge
Juliet Riddell is head of new formats at the Financial Times and has produced and directed multiple award-winning videos including a Webby, AIB and BAFTA nomination for the FT. Juliet was previously a multimedia Commissioning Editor at the Guardian, where she executive produced an award-winning short drama, a new YouTube channel and arts, current affairs and documentary series.
Juliet has over 15 years experience as a TV producer, director and development executive; including producing two BAFTA winning arts series with Grayson Perry for C4 and prime time factual programmes for BBC, ITV and Sky Arts.
Ritula Shah
Chair of the Journalism judging panel
Ritula Shah is a journalist and broadcaster and currently hosts ‘Calm Classics’ on Classic FM. She has worked across a range of programmes on BBC Radio 4 and between 2008-2023 was the lead presenter on Radio 4’s daily news and current affairs programme, ‘The World Tonight’.
Ritula is an advisor to the Royal United Services Institute – the world’s oldest and the UK’s leading defence and security think tank, as well as being a trustee for visual arts organisation INIVA, and an ambassador for the British Asian Trust.
Bushra Siddiq
Image courtesy of BAFTA / Oliver Mayhall
TV/Video Judge
Bushra Siddiq is a Producer, Director, and Development Producer who has spent the last 17 years working across both development and production in factual, documentaries, and on flagship news and current affairs programmes. Among her credits are films for the BBC’s Panorama programme, ITV’s Tonight show, and Channel 4’s Dispatches and Cutting Edge series. ‘Racist Britain’ – a film she produced for Dispatches in 2016 – was nominated in the Best Investigation category at the Asian Media Awards 2017. She is currently on the BAFTA Elevate 2022-2024 Producer programme.
Mark Warburton
Journalism Judge
Based in Manchester, Mark Warburton is a self-shooting TV Producer Director, trainer and consultant with over 25 years’ experience in TV, radio and digital content-creation including factual, music, religion, children’s, current affairs, education and charities. Mark has extensive experience of live events and OBs, and has led broadcast collaborations with Buckingham Palace, St Paul’s Cathedral, Cabinet Office, Glastonbury, Comic Relief and the NHS. Mark is also a professional musician and published composer for TV and production music.
Ben Zand
Journalism Judge
Ben Zand is an award-winning British-Iranian filmmaker, journalist, producer and director from Liverpool. He makes thought-provoking documentaries that focus on access and investigations into some of the most controversial characters of our time, such as ‘The Secret World of Incels’ and documentaries that take us to places we may not care to go ourselves, such as ‘Kingpins’. Ben is the founder and CEO of ZANDLAND, an award-winning multi-channel production company based in Liverpool and London. Before that he worked as a documentary executive for BBC Studios and was the Editor and Head of the BBC’s documentary bureau, BBC Pop Up. His work has taken him around the world – meeting some of our most influential, dangerous and fascinating people.
Shortlisters
In addition to our judges, we are hugely indebted to our 2024 shortlisters, all of whom lent us their time, energy, enthusiasm and their expertise to the category they were asked to work on. Our thanks to:
Ngunan Adamu, Toyosi Adebusuyi, Aaqil Ahmed, Hanan Al habach, Bridget Cass, Rob Cave, Olive Clancy, Kate Cornell, Tim Daykin, Julia Galus, Mateusz Gasinski, Hannah Ludlow, John Matheson, Nana-Adwoa Mbeutcha, Anna McNamee, Reem Nouss, Mark Perrow, Angela Robson, David Strachan, Bryony Taylor, Matt Watts and Chris Wilson.