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JOURNALISM

 

3;
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Awards 2018
won

In turbulent times, investigative journalism fights back

NOMINATED
FINALIST 2018

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haring findings revealed through
investigative journalism, the
Bureau is a trusted, international
resource – where citizens come to
better understand complex issues;
where NGOs get evidence to support
their campaigns; where specialists and
politicians come for facts to support
positive change.

From local to global, we investigate
serious, systemic issues affecting
our societies. Working collaboratively
to source stories from the ground
up, we can report with, not on, the
communities affected. Strong networks
and partners help to get our findings
into the hands of changemakers in
government and big business.

Our co-publishing model enables
maximum reach through print,
broadcast and online partners at
local, national and international level.
Through creative storytelling we engage
our audiences with issues that affect
their lives and their world.
We tell the stories that matter.

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 It is by digging deep over a sustained period of time that
our journalism can make a lasting difference.

I

n 2018 as our world confronted seismic
international events, we continued to
shine a light on areas that the wider
media ignore. We brought important but
under-reported issues to the front pages
and into public debate, sparking change
at a local, national and global level.

Foreword from
the Chief Executive,

Rachel
Oldroyd

We focused on six key areas affecting
individuals and communities across the
UK and internationally, because digging
deep over a sustained period of time is
how our journalism can make a lasting
difference.
We looked at superbugs and the impact
of antibiotic resistance - the world’s
biggest threat to public health - with the
clock about to be turned back on decades
of medical advances. Global efforts to
eradicate diseases such as TB, typhoid
and malaria, to reduce child mortality
rates and to improve outcomes for
patients in some of the world’s poorest
countries are all being challenged as
important medicines increasingly do not
work. Our reporting revealed actions
and decisions that are exacerbating this,
highlighting where change is needed.
Transparency and accountability in
lobbying, PR and spin were areas of
concern at the Bureau long before the
world coined the phrase “fake news”.
As information manipulation has reached
new heights the Bureau has continued to
keep readers informed about the means
by which the powerful aim to influence
public opinion.
Our award-winning drones team
widened its brief, tracking how Western

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superpowers fight Shadow Wars – the
conflicts that don’t make the front pages.
We investigated CIA-supported local
militias and how private mercenaries
are increasingly the go-to-force. We
continued our work in Afghanistan – the
forgotten war – digging into the continued
drone and air war.
In 2018 we took on new investigations
too. We exposed major issues in
industrialised farming and gave readers
information on how this impacts the
food they eat. This global industry
is controlled by a handful of littleknown supercompanies and individuals
exploiting the growing demand for animal
protein - one of the most significant
changes to food production across the
world.
Working collaboratively with individuals
and organisations across the UK, through
Bureau Local we took on local authorities
and the government’s failure to properly
fund them, digging into their creaking
finances and the dramatic cuts being
made to support services for the most
vulnerable people in our country.
We also exposed the shocking numbers
of homeless people dying in the UK.
Can there be a greater litmus test of
the failure of the fabric of our society
than measuring our efforts to overcome
homelessness?
Bureau Local continues to have a
widespread impact on the journalism
ecosystem. Since its launch less than two
years ago, our team has built a community
of over 800 members who have worked

together on 10 investigations, producing
more than 280 exclusive local stories.
Our innovative approach has been
recognised through numerous awards and
we have been working with not-for-profit
news organisation Correctiv in Germany
to replicate the model over there.
Significant growth this year in publishing
partnerships means our findings have
reached millions of readers, with work
carried in the Guardian, the Telegraph,
the Times, the New York Times, the
Hindu, the Malawi Times and many local
and specialist publications. Our work was
also broadcast widely by Channel 4, ITV,
the BBC and CNN.
We welcomed new funding partners on
board too. Luminate, Rudolf Augstein
Stiftung and Lankelly Chase Foundation
joined our long-term supporters,
including our founders David and
Elaine Potter who share more on their
commitment to the Bureau at the close of
this Annual Report.
It has been a great privilege to lead
the Bureau through 2018, to have the
opportunity to work with dedicated,
brilliant journalists, enthusiastic and
supportive funders, collegiate publishing
partners and collaborators, and
interested, engaged readers.
In 2019 we will listen more to all these
valued constituents of our Bureau
community to inform our progress
and success in these turbulent and fast
changing times.
Thank you for your support.

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 Strikes triple in Yemen and
Somalia: Bureau reveals

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Refuge Woman theatre tour:

Trump’s first year in numbers

Bureau shares harsh realities
with audiences across the UK

Councils in crisis: Bureau uncovers

Babies dying in Malawi: Bureau shines a

the disaster of local government
finances across the UK

light on tragedies of antibiotic resistance

Bureau Local wins:

Bureau wins: Landmark press

European Press Prize for Innovation

freedom case at the European
Court of Human Rights

Untreatable infections in UK
hospitals: Bureau issues wake-up call

Dying Homeless: Bureau Local
investigation reports 449 people
died last year

Controversial US-style beef
“feedlots”: Bureau exposes arrival in

Afghan airstrikes transparency:

the UK, unnoticed and unregulated

Bureau data crucial as US government
lifts data blackout

Law changed in India: Bureau reporting

Superbugs in conflict zones:

underpins ban on sale of antibiotics
without prescription

Bureau finds doctors battling
“an epidemic”

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 It is difficult to overstate the importance of
the Dying Homeless Project, which has shed new light
on a subject that was ignored for too long.

DYING HOMELESS

Matt Downie, Director of Policy and External Affairs, Crisis

T

he Bureau Local’s ‘Dying
Homeless’ reporting revealed, for
the first time, the scale of homeless
deaths across the UK. By telling
the personal stories of the people
behind the statistics, we brought
national attention to this
shocking issue.
The project started in February 2018.
We were in the midst of freezing
winter conditions and wanted to
know how many people were dying
while homeless. We soon found that
no official body held the figure.
So we started counting, aware that
this deficit of information meant

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no-one knew how widespread the
issue was or whether lessons could be
learnt to prevent deaths in
the future.
We logged the details of every
homeless person that had died since
October 2017, and told as many of
their stories as possible.

At the end of the year this strong,
nationwide reporting revealed that
over 449 people had died while
homeless in the UK since October
2017. James Brokenshire - Secretary
of State for Housing, Communities
and Local Government - called
the findings “utterly shocking” and
promised case reviews into deaths.

More than 100 journalists, members
of the public and outreach workers
helped compile the database and
more than 70 local and 50 national
articles were produced - including
multiple leading stories on
Channel 4 News.

Several councils launched local
investigations. Crucially, the Office
for National Statistics used our work
to produce the first ever statistics
on homeless deaths. Scottish and
Northern Irish equivalents are set
to follow.

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 The Bureau’s research should send shivers down the spines of ministers
because they know this is a crisis in part caused by their actions.

Andrew Gwynne, Shadow Secretary for Communities and Local Government

local power
A

head of government funding
decisions in March 2018, the
Bureau Local team set out to
scrutinise council budgets across
the UK as part of a collaborative
investigation into local government
finances.
In February we brought together
nearly 200 journalists and community
members across five UK cities for a
one-day ‘collaborative reporting day’.
The resulting stories revealed that
more than half of councils in England
were planning to slash costs by cutting
spending on services for children and

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that four local authorities were in
financial crisis and using reserves to
balance their books. Our investigation
made The Times’ front page and
caused several MPs to respond.
At the end of the year we revealed
that some of the smallest local
authorities in England had amassed
debts equivalent to more than ten
times their spending power in order
to buy commercial property. Experts
warned that this tied the future of
vital public services to the uncertainty
of the property market. Shortly after
our reporting, the council that had

borrowed the most to buy up property
announced it would no longer be
making these kind of investments.
More than 70 people were involved in
this part of the investigation, including
our partners at The Times and the
Local Government Chronicle.
Following this reporting, James
Brokenshire - the Secretary for
Housing, Communities & Local
Government - spoke out in the
Commons with a warning to local
authorities and announced he would
discuss intervention with the Treasury.

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 I have no doubt that many actions over the next year will be in large part
because of how close and real you painted this global threat.

Michael Craig, Senior Advisor for Antibiotic Resistance Coordination and Strategy
US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Superbugs
D

rug-resistant infections are
one of the biggest threats to
public health according to the World
Health Organisation. Estimated
to kill 700,000 people worldwide
each year, this number could rise to
10 million annually by 2050 if no
action is taken.
After the lack of reporting to inform
public understanding of this crisis,
the Bureau began investigating
issues around antibiotic resistance in
2016, leading to greater awareness
and sparking positive change.
Across the world more than 50%
of antibiotics are fed to animals,
and some of them are used just
to help them grow rather than to
tackle illness. Our January story
on the ‘last hope’ antibiotic being
used to fatten chickens was widely
syndicated in India, the UK and
globally, and led to local papers like
the Kashmir Monitor launching
their own investigations.

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In response, Dame Sally Davies,
England’s Chief Medical Officer,
made a public statement calling
for all use of antibiotics for growth
promotion in agriculture to be
banned within five years. A lawyer in
Maharashtra, India’s second biggest
state by population, put our story
before the Bombay High Court who
ordered the state’s Food and Drug
Administration to instruct all animal
drug stores not to sell antibiotics to
farmers without a valid prescription.
With new support from the
European Journalism Centre we
produced stories on how superbugs
are devastating health systems in
Yemen, Malawi, Afghanistan, India,
Ghana and Gaza; the emergence
of nearly untreatable infections
in British hospitals; US farms
continuing to use crucial antibiotics;
and a misleading campaign by one
of the world’s biggest animal drugs
companies, which Dame Sally
Davies later condemned.

As well as changing laws, issues
around antibiotic resistance are
reaching far wider audiences thanks
to our successful international
publication partnerships with CNN,
the New York Times, The Times of
India, the Times Group Malawi, and
with specialist medical magazines
including The Lancet Infectious
Diseases and The BMJ.
In September the Bureau’s health
and science editor Madlen Davies
was invited to launch the US
government’s international drive to
stem the rising tide of superbugs,
held during the United Nations’
General Assembly conference.
An audience of nearly 400 including
world leaders, pharmaceutical
company executives, heads of
biotech companies, foundations and
NGOs watched our film, produced
in partnership with CNN, on the
superbugs that are killing babies
in Malawi.

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 The Bureau “reveals the global reach of
automation and amplification in digital politics on social media,
orchestrated by private actors.”

Information Manipulation
and Spin

Oxford Internet Institute

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pin and digital propaganda
remained a hot topic in 2018
as political volatility continued
to shake the world and foreign
governments sought to shore up
their standing with an unpredictable
White House.
In March we published a major
investigation in the Times
exposing the Saudi Crown Prince’s
unprecedented PR drive, and the
role of a senior British diplomat
within it. This was widely cited at
the time and was picked up again
by Private Eye, Sky News and
others later in the year following
the murder of journalist Jamal
Khashoggi. The following month
we revealed that one of the people

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involved in the disgraced public
relations firm Bell Pottinger’s
controversial “black ops” work in
Iraq had been hired by the UAE to
make a slick ‘documentary’
vilifying Qatar.

And in January the New York Times
credited the Bureau’s pioneering
work exposing companies such
as Devumi which generate fake
followers on social media sites.
The practice was later ruled illegal.

The team later unearthed some
surprising tactics being touted by
two British public relations firms
aimed at influencing the outcome
of Macedonia’s name change
referendum.

Later in the year, we followed
up with the far right in Germany
after our previous work on online
networks there. When the stabbing
of a German citizen by suspected
foreigners triggered unexpectedly
large anti-immigrant demonstrations
in August, we revealed that a
cluster of ‘alternative’ news sites
we had identified in 2017 had
been promoting incendiary false
information about the circumstances
of the attack.

In August, our work on the bot
network supporting the Gupta
family in South Africa was cited
extensively in the Oxford Internet
Institute’s annual inventory of social
media manipulation.

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 The Bureau delivered a series of dramatic exposés
on the industrial scale of much farming in the UK, providing a
huge public service for both consumers and the farming industry.

Press Gazette judges at Specialist Media Awards 2018

Food & Farming
T

he industrialisation of food
production, including the rise of
livestock ‘megafarms’, is increasing
globally, but this comes at a cost to
food safety and public health, the
environment and farm animals.
Following the Bureau’s major
investigations into the rise of
megafarms in 2017, and our indepth reporting around food safety
in the meat sector, 2018 saw us join
forces with The Guardian. As part of
the newspaper’s ‘Animals Farmed’
series, the Bureau began a twoyear, collaborative investigation into
industrialised farming.
We launched with a major
investigation revealing a catalogue of
serious hygiene failings in dozens of
US meat plants, including compelling

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new evidence of dirty chicken meat
being treated with chlorine - a practice
that has sparked controversy in the
debate about trade deals post-Brexit.
This was quickly followed by a further
front page investigation revealing
the worrying volume of regulatory
breaches in meat plants across
the UK.
In May 2018, we revealed - for the
first time - how intensive US-style beef
feedlots had arrived in the UK almost
unnoticed. We obtained dramatic
pictures of thousands of beef cattle
being held in grassless pens in about a
dozen sites across the east of England.
The images provoked a major response
from the public, particularly on social
media, and led to supermarkets having
to defend their decision to source from
the feedlots.

The investigation highlighted a serious
regulatory loophole - that intensive
beef farms do not require a permit
in order to operate, in contrast to
intensive pig and poultry farms.
As a result the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
has no records of how many beef
farms there are in the UK, prompting
MPs and campaigners to call for the
loophole to be closed.
With continued focus on corporate
accountability, we also exposed the
Big Pharma PR campaigns designed
to muddy the waters around the threat
posed by antibiotic use in livestock
production; and the shocking human
cost of the meat industry, with serious
injuries found to be commonplace in
both US and UK meat plants.

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 US strikes leading to civilian casualties more than doubled in the first nine months of 2018,
surpassing all years since records began in 2009.

From the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan

Shadow Wars

A

merica’s foreign engagements
under President Trump have
become messier and less accountable.
From Somalia to Sangin, arms-length
interventions are combining the
aggressive hard power of traditional
wars - drones, airstrikes and ground
raids - with the lack of accountability
of covert ones.
In June 2018, we launched our
‘Shadow Wars’ project to track and
monitor US actions and highlight their
impact on civilians. This represents
a new direction for the team, which
previously focussed on the use of
drone warfare.

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Towards the end of the year, following
the Bureau’s reporting, and concern
among civil society groups about the
sharp decline of military transparency
under President Trump, a year-long
blackout of detailed information
about US airstrikes in Afghanistan
was lifted.
The US resumed publishing this
data, having previously declared it
too sensitive for public release. Our
work here is by no means done some of this information has since
been made private again - but this
progress demonstrates the value and
importance of maintaining continued

pressure for transparency. At the
same time, we want to highlight the
impact of war on people’s lives. Our
major story ‘One Day in Afghanistan’
was the result of months spent
documenting every attack during an
ordinary day in the country, using
unpublished official documents and
on-the-ground reporting.
We found details of 31 attacks and
more than 20 air strikes, killing at
least 60 people in 16 provinces. This
snapshot investigation, published on
the 17th anniversary of the war, was
a powerful reminder of the scale and
human cost of the conflict.

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 We need a specific funding model for refuges, because without it people die.

Labour MP Jess Phillips,
Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Domestic Violence

Domestic Violence

T

he Bureau Local team continued
to report on vulnerable women
and children fleeing domestic
violence in the UK, and the stretched
system that is often not delivering.

refuges had been cut by more than
24% since 2010 and that over a
thousand women had been turned
away from refuges in six months
alone.

In January we revealed how those
asking for information about their
partner’s record of domestic violence
are 10 times less likely to receive
it from police in some parts of the
country than others.

Top police chiefs also spoke out, with
one Police and Crime Commissioner,
saying he was “horrified” at the way
funding had been cut.

This followed our investigation that
found funding for domestic violence

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Twelve MPs, including the Labour
leader and key shadow ministers,
spoke out about the provision for
people affected by domestic violence.

The Department for Housing,
Communities and Local Government
launched a consultation on the
funding of refuges and our findings
were raised in Prime Minister’s
Questions.
More than 30 local journalists,
volunteers, refuge managers,
survivors and other experts
participated in the investigation
which resulted in 75 local and
national stories, including reports in
the Guardian, the Times and
Channel 4 News.

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 Thank you for teaching me more than prison taught me.

Audience member

Refuge Woman Tour
T

he Bureau Local brought
investigative reporting to the
stage this year. Refuge Woman, a
semi-autobiographical show, gave
audiences up and down the country
a searingly honest and darkly
funny insight into life in a domestic
violence refuge.
While reporting on domestic
violence we came to know Cash
Carraway, a writer who had been
living in a women’s refuge in London
when the roof came crashing in.
We heard Cash had plans to turn
her experiences into a one-woman
show. We worked with her to
develop it and take it on the road

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to destinations where Bureau Local
members had produced stories.

ways, sparked debate and reached
different audiences.

We toured the show in community
centres and fringe theatres in
Birmingham, Norwich, Leeds,
Bristol, London and Lancaster, as
well as to the Byline Festival in
East Sussex. After each performance
we invited local journalists, refuge
managers and support workers to tell
the audience about their findings on
regional funding cuts and the needs
of the particular community.

Perhaps most importantly, we
supported a survivor of domestic
violence to tell her story in her
own words.

Through this innovative combination
of investigative journalism and
theatre, we informed people in new

Audience members were moved,
saying “It was pure, real, raw and
honest”; “Cash is a voice to be
listened to and a voice for those that
can’t be heard”; “Cash, thank you for
teaching me more than prison taught
me”; “It was great to listen to the
Bureau of Investigative Journalism
give us insight and detail we wouldn’t
get via the [traditional] media.”

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 A remarkable use of collaboration and knowledge-transfer
to strengthen data-driven, local journalism.
Bureau Local can elevate local stories to show their national impact,
and reveal how large-scale developments affect local communities.

The Bureau Local:
Our communities matter

Stephanie Reuter, Rudolf Augstein Foundation

B

ureau Local was built on the
belief that local journalism is
a crucial part of the fight for an
informed, participatory and just
society. Together with our network
we have published over 280
exclusive local stories and over 100
national stories in just 20 months.
In the wake of the Brexit
referendum, communities across
the UK are demanding to be heard.
More power is being given to public
bodies outside London while the
collapsing commercial model for
news means that local papers face
cuts to their staff and resources.
The capacity for investigative, data
journalism where it is urgently
needed is extremely limited.
Launched in March 2017, Bureau
Local has now built an 800-strong
- and growing - network across
the UK whose members include

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regional and national news outlets,
local reporters, hyperlocal bloggers,
technologists, community-minded
citizens and specialist contributors.
We join forces on investigations
with the aim of strengthening our
information ecosystem, holding
power to account at both a local and
national level, and telling stories
that matter to communities.
With each investigation, we make
relevant information and datasets
accessible to everyone in the
network and help members find out
how issues play out in their area.
As reporting takes place across the
country, we then connect the dots to
create a national picture.
We focus on mobilising communities
around our journalism and ensuring
we report with, not just on, the
communities we cover. We run
online and offline community

forums, meetups and live journalism
events to bring our stories
to everyone.
Our collective reporting method
produces broader and deeper
investigations than would be
possible for any individual
newsroom, allowing us to shine a
light on systemic issues and hold
those in power to account. A
national perspective increases the
impact of the story and increases
support locally, through reach,
community mobilisation and
lasting change.
In 2018 the team has brought
together new, inspired funders who
are keen to join existing partners
in supporting our ambitions for
2019 and beyond. Further funding
is being sought to deepen our work
with communities and strengthen
our business model.

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 Publishing partners

our finances

T

he Bureau works collaboratively with publishing partners, from local to global, including those listed here.
Beyond this, Bureau findings were cited in national and international media on average 300 times a month,
peaking at 1,000 citations in December.

INCOME

KEY:
Donations from Individuals: £240,433

20.8%
other: £13,233

1.1%

52.8%
25.3%

Trusts and foundations: £299,899
Project Grants: £610,312
TOTAL: £1,155,877

expenditure

KEY:
Editorial and Production costs: £235,300

15.9%

20.2%

BUREAU LOCAL: £365,000
OTHER INVESTIGATIONS: £132,500

8.0%
SUPERBUGS: £90,500

5.4%

31.4%
7.8%

FOOD & FARMING: £62,400
SHADOW WARS: £92,800

11.4%

ADMIN, OFFICE AND FUNDRAISING: £185,100
TOTAL: £1,163,600

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 We intend to crusade against the backward drift of human rights,
to demand and deliver transparency and the hard pursuit of truth.

Elaine Potter

Founders of the Bureau
W

hen we launched the Bureau
I wrote: “Democracy itself is
imperilled in the absence of honest
information and a robust watchdog to
hold government and the powerful to
account. Without that we all become
susceptible to the manipulation
and deceptions orchestrated by
governments, industry or even the
media.” In the eight years since then
things have got much worse.
Anti-semitism with its ugly long
history has again come to life, far right
movements have spread across Europe,
the Americas and around the world,
minorities are under threat, racism is
becoming tolerated. Each year it seems
a new and feted ‘illiberal democracy’
comes into being to sit all too easily
alongside established dictatorships.

And everywhere the press is under
enormous pressure, being diminished
daily with wild and indiscriminate
assertions of fake news whilst fake
news itself is being manufactured and
proliferating across the internet.
The Bureau has gradually been building
a new bulwark to address these issues.
Through our pioneering Bureau Local
we are bringing local accountability
journalism back to life as well as
creating an original model for others
to adopt. Globally through our varied
and penetrating probes into matters of
public importance we are positioning
ourselves to be powerful truth tellers.
We intend to crusade against the
backward drift of human rights, to
demand and deliver transparency and
the hard pursuit of truth.

We are forging new partnerships to
enhance our impact and help find ways
of taking the press back to its Fourth
Estate duties.
Many years ago when working
on a major investigation into the
aerospace and airline industry, I learnt
that the safest airlines were those
which operated in countries where
accountability was strongest.
We believe this observation holds true
beyond the airline industry and that
holding the powerful to account is the
most important role of investigative
journalism. With huge ambition we
intend to do just that.
Elaine Potter
Founder of the Bureau

David and Elaine Potter

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 By focusing on long-term, sustained investigations,
the Bureau has become recognised for their work on specific topics,
which enhances the impact they can have.

Kitty von Bertele, Luminate Foundation

our supporters
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

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e are grateful to all our supporters - inspired grantmakers and individuals looking to
strengthen communities and change our society for the better:

Acorn House
314-320 Gray’s Inn Rd
Kings Cross
London WC1X 8DP

Adessium Foundation

Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust

Agora Journalism Center

Open Society Foundations

Sir Donald and Lady Elizabeth Cruickshank

Lankelly Chase Foundation

Phone: +44 203 8927490

European Journalism Centre

Luminate

Email: info@thebureauinvestigates.com

The Evan Cornish Foundation

Pears Foundation

Website: www.thebureauinvestigates.com

Friends of the Bureau

David and Elaine Potter

Freedom of the Press Foundation

Reva and David Logan Foundation

Copyright: The Bureau of Investigative Journalism

Google: Digital News Innovation

Rudolf Augstein Stiftung

Report written & compiled: McCormick & Billings ltd.

Google: Global News Initiative

Joseph Schull

Design by: Suketchi Branding & Design, South Africa

Guardian.org Foundation
In addition, Google sponsored fellowships for new journalists at the Bureau, and we received pro bono services
from Gorkana and Simons, Muirhead & Burton solicitors.

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