The Olympic Games are awarded by the International Olympic Committee seven years before delivery after an intense bidding process between other candidate cities (something that I will be writing about further in the coming weeks). When the rights to host … Continue reading →
Dispatches’ fascinating investigation into how Olympic tickets have been allocated is airing right now. You can watch the trailer here, with on-demand to appear later. Essential watching.
Thanks to Tony Hirst for pointing that the Department of Culture, Media and Sport have some core data available on culture and sport in England. It is available national and regionally and ranges from investment, education, tourism, health and so … Continue reading →
One of the barriers that student journalists often come up against is their lack of contacts in a particular field. Here is a guide to building that contacts book:
1. Directories
Directories are the most obvious place to start looking for…
TweetA few weeks ago, we blogged about how the Education Committee was soliciting questions from the public to ask Michael Gove via Twitter. Did you miss the actual committee meeting where Gove answered the questions? Well, there are a few … Continue reading →
Following up on our post about new FOI guidelines, Cleland Thom has compiled a list of excuses sometimes used by officials to refuse an FOI request, and how to use the guidelines to get past those. Some of the highlights:
“Your request w…
NHS whistleblower Dr Rita Pal has written a post for Help Me Investigate Health on the issues for journalists to consider when working with whistleblowers. It's a really thorough piece of work with the sorts of insights you only get fr…
For 35 years Paul Dale reported on Birmingham City Council for the local press. As this first interview for Help Me Investigate, he gives his tips on starting to investigate local government, and the importance of human contacts. In this cl…
Anthony Barnett writes compellingly about the importance not only of investigating issues, but of continuing to report the same thing "until the penny drops". Here's "[Ian Hislop] made a striking point, for me at least,…