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Private Notes
John Sweeney investigates the secretive world of the family courts and asks whether some parents may have unfairly lost their children forever.
The crucial evidence against them came from doctors, who said that tiny fractures on their babies' x-rays were evidence of abuse. But some experts now believe that lack of vitamin D or rickets might point to another cause for the fractures.
One young mother has taken desperate measures after losing her daughter - she has gone on the run from the UK to have her second child abroad. But even this drastic step may not keep her out of the reach of social services
The country's police firearms units are described as an elite. These highly-trained marksmen use lethal force to tackle serious organised crime and take illegal guns off our streets. They also have to react quickly to events such as the murder of Lee Rigby in Woolwich.
But they are under intense scrutiny; the shooting of Mark Duggan in 2011 led to serious rioting, and another killing has been ruled unlawful following a public inquiry. At least one police officer is facing the possibility of being put on trial for murder.
Now, for the first time, officers who have killed break their silence to speak out to Panorama. The programme has gained unique access to the unit responsible for killing Mark Duggan, and examines the controversial tactic behind these shootings that is still being used to stop suspects today.
The cost of the Winter Olympics in Russia has quadrupled to a record-breaking £30 billion following allegations of massive corruption. Reporter John Sweeney investigates claims that lucrative contracts have been handed to President Putin's friends, and that billions have been embezzled by fraudsters and corrupt officials.
Despite the huge cost of the games, thousands of Olympic workers say they have not been paid, and some claim they were tortured by the police when they tried to protest. The games in Sochi are supposed to be a showcase for modern Russia, but what do they really reveal about President Putin's state?
It's one of the most closed and repressive societies on earth. Its ruthless young leader Kim Jong-un has threatened nuclear war against America and recently executed his own uncle. Yet in the heart of North Korea's absolute dictatorship, a remarkable university - paid for by the west - is attempting to open the minds of the secretive state's future elite.
Panorama has gained unprecedented access to this most unusual of academic institutions - which is educating the sons of the brutal regime. Reporter Chris Rogers lives with them on campus and asks: can the class of 2014 help to bring the hermit nation in from the cold?
Panorama goes undercover in Britain's multimillion-pound trade in immigration visas and exposes the breath-taking frauds that allow bogus foreign students - some with little or no English - to remain in the UK.
Around a hundred thousand non-EU students applied to the UK Border Agency in 2013 to extend their stay, but it seems studying is not the main aim for all of them as some simply want to stay on to work illegally.
Reporter Richard Watson unmasks the criminal immigration agents who - in return for cash - secure places at private colleges by arranging forged and fraudulent documents, including bank statements that are good enough to fool immigration officers.
The programme reveals how government-approved exams - designed to weed out those with inadequate English - are being routinely subverted with fake sitters taking spoken English exams for the bogus students and multiple choice tests where they're given all the answers.
As Britain is battered yet again by extreme weather, reporter Richard Bilton investigates the causes of the flooding that has devastated so much of the country. He meets the families whose lives have been ruined and asks whether more could be done to protect our towns and villages. Or should the government now be making tough choices about which places to save?
Panorama investigates the mysterious disappearance in Dubai of a British businessman. The British authorities handed over thousands of pages of his confidential documents to a hardline Iranian regime accused of human rights abuses. Now the UK government stands accused of ignoring the warnings that their actions posed a risk to his life. So why did they ignore those warnings?
Hundreds of thousands of people across the country are now getting free handouts of food. So what's really behind the dramatic rise in the number of food banks and the claims of hunger in Britain? Reporter Darragh MacIntyre investigates whether it's the economic squeeze, benefit changes or, as the government has suggested, it's simply a case of people taking advantage of free food on offer.
As Russia and the West square up to each other over Ukraine, Paul Kenyon presents this special report from inside the flashpoint military bases of Crimea as they are surrounded by Russian troops. He gains exclusive access to Ukrainian soldiers and commanders preparing for possible conflict and, using previously unbroadcast footage, examines the shooting of nearly a hundred protestors in Kiev, an act that led to a revolution and could intensify old, Cold War rivalries.
'Anything and Everything' is what doctors who work in A&E say the initials really stand for - where the violent, the drink and drug abusers, the lonely, the frail, the elderly plus those who really shouldn't be there in the first place, are all in a day's work. Panorama reporter Vivian White spends a week in University Hospital of North Tees in Stockton, hearing from doctors and nurses about the relentless pressure of working to strict government waiting time targets. He also meets those who have had enough and have quit this most demanding part of the NHS.
Panorama investigates fraud in the National Health Service. With the NHS under financial pressure as never before, reporter Fiona Walker finds fraud in/against the NHS could be far greater than benefits fraud but with fewer resources to tackle it. The programme hears claims that the health service in the UK is losing billions every year to fraudsters - enough to employ 330,000 new nurses. In Britain's 21st century health service, where multimillion private contracts are up for grabs, Panorama goes in search of the fraudsters to reveal their crimes and highlights calls for tougher penalties for those who harm patients and steal NHS resources and money that should be used to care for the sick.
Up and down the country, directly-elected Mayors control billions of pounds of public funds. But can this lead to too much power being concentrated into the hands of one politician? John Ware investigates the directly-elected Mayor of Tower Hamlets in London – where opponents claim he’s used public funds both to promote himself and to create a local power base that, come election time this May, will help return him to office. Panorama reveals evidence suggesting that, under the Mayoral system in Tower Hamlets, accountability and transparency have been put into reverse, with the Mayor refusing to answer opposition questions about spending decisions involving millions of pounds of public money - and also how he has injected faith into politics.
On the eve of the Queen's historic trip to the Vatican, Jane Corbin examines Pope Francis' shake-up of the Catholic Church. Are his reforms for real, or more about style than substance?
A year after Francis was elected following his predecessor's shock resignation, Panorama travels to Argentina, his homeland, to find out what drives him and asks if the Pope is raising expectations that some in the Vatican will not allow him to fulfil.
Panorama goes undercover to expose the bailiffs who seize cars and demand huge fees in what has become a multimillion-pound business: chasing unpaid parking tickets. Bailiffs recovering debts for local authorities say they do a public service, hunting down those who don't pay up. But Panorama has evidence that some bailiffs are intimidating motorists, exaggerating their powers and pumping up fees. As councils report increasing revenues from penalty fines, reporter John Sweeney investigates whether new laws to curb the bailiffs' worst excesses go far enough.
As the government's benefits changes begin to bite, Panorama gains exclusive access over six months to Brent - one of London's worst-hit boroughs - and follows the personal stories of some of the people most affected by the changes. As claimants struggle with the loss of hundreds of pounds of benefits and have to move to other parts of the UK where rents are cheaper, we follow people battling to stay in their homes and a local authority forced to ask to them to leave as their benefits are capped.
With the NHS drug bill topping £10 billion in 2013, this investigation examines the tactics employed by drug companies to tap into that lucrative market and influence which medicines your doctor prescribes.
Strict rules govern drug company spending in the UK, but still they pay out millions to doctors to attend and speak at conferences. Panorama goes undercover to see this subtle persuasion at work and asks whether you should have the right to know who is paying your doctor.
And as Britain's most profitable drug company, GlaxoSmithKline, waits to hear whether it will face criminal charges following allegations of bribery in China, the programme reveals new evidence that GSK was recently paying doctors to boost prescriptions much closer to home, in Europe.
Bernie Ecclestone has dominated Formula One motor racing for forty years and made billions from the sport. But two courts say he paid a $44m bribe, a judge recently concluded that it was 'impossible to regard him as a reliable or truthful witness', and he may have avoided a billion pounds of UK tax. Panorama's Darragh Macintyre investigates the truth about the boss of F1, Bernie Ecclestone, and asks why he is still in charge.
Panorama investigates what life can be like inside the world of elderly care and asks if parts of the system are letting down a generation. Secret filming inside two of Britain's care homes uncovers what can happen away from the eyes of relatives and inspectors. It shows the lives of some elderly and vulnerable people blighted by poor care. Care workers have been suspended and others convicted of assault following the filming - revealing residents being neglected and mistreated.
The Muslim prison population in England and Wales has doubled in the past ten years to nearly one in seven inmates. This rise is five times faster than the increase in the overall jail population.
Evidence shows most Muslims are not radicalised, but the prison system is also home to the UK's greatest concentration of Islamic terrorists and extremists. Many more are converted or radicalised behind bars.
Reporter Raphael Rowe follows one radical convert as he leaves prison, interviews some convicted terrorists and extremists about their experiences inside and asks if the authorities are doing enough to prevent the increasing threat of radical Islam inside prison.
As Ukraine moves closer to civil war, reporter Paul Kenyon spends weeks with balaclava-wearing separatists, as they seize towns and fight for a breakaway republic.
He follows men who've become some of the most powerful in the conflict. There's Miroslav - the former history teacher with a newborn baby - who joins protesters storming a local government building and is now part of the three man governing body of the People's Republic of Donetsk and Alexei, a former small businessman who now finds himself leading a 200 strong army.
The programme also questions the new Mayor of Slaviansk - who rose to power during the rebellion after taking his predecessor prisoner, and who now boasts he's holding forty hostages in the town hall's cellars.
Jimmy Savile was free to abuse hundreds of young people across the UK over six decades. It happened in BBC dressing rooms, hospital wards, children's homes and schools, yet no-one stopped him. As the BBC and Department of Health each prepare to publish their own inquiries into the scandal, Panorama's Shelley Jofre investigates why Savile was given free access to the most vulnerable patients at Broadmoor Hospital and asks how the DJ got so close to the heart of Britain's establishment.
Next week, the 'beautiful game' is coming home. Brazil, the most successful nation in football history, is hosting the 2014 World Cup. But the build-up has been overshadowed by violent protests against the spiralling cost of staging the tournament. In a country where a quarter of the population live in extreme poverty, there's widespread anger at what's perceived as the increasing divide between the rich and poor. The multi-million pound new stadiums sit alongside an epidemic of drug addiction and child prostitution. Tonight Panorama reveals the shame of a country where children as young as 12 sell their bodies for the price of a soft drink, where drug cartels control whole swathes of city centres and where the poor are feeling more dispossessed than ever before.
Expert witnesses who give evidence in court are a vital part of our legal system. They are supposed to act in the best interests of justice and not just help their clients. Yet an undercover investigation by Panorama has found experts in handwriting, CCTV analysis and animal behaviour prepared to help clients hide the truth in breach of their professional obligations. And, as reporter Daniel Foggo discovers, it follows the government's failure to act on calls from the Law Commission for tighter regulation of court experts.
The number of people made homeless by private landlords has tripled in the last four years. It's now the single biggest cause of homelessness in England. Reporter Richard Bilton meets the homeless families forced out by private landlords and asks whether the government's increasing reliance on the private rental sector is placing the vulnerable at risk.
In a Panorama Special, Robert Peston investigates the questions behind the phone hacking trial which saw David Cameron's former spokesman, Andy Coulson, convicted and three other News of the World News editors plead guilty.
Did politicians of all parties and police help to cover-up the hacking scandal for years because of their own close relationships with Rupert Murdoch's News International?
There is a crisis today in America's prison system which has little to do with crime. It contributes to the abuse and even the deaths of some prisoners at the hands of those paid to take care of them.
With access to two US jails, reporter Hilary Andersson finds America's prisons are now having to accommodate vast numbers of inmates with serious mental health problems. The programme reveals that more than a million mentally troubled Americans are imprisoned and may be chained to beds, sprayed with pepper spray and kept in isolation indefinitely.
An investigation into Isis and how it is ripping Iraq apart. Paul Wood speaks to members of the terror group and sees the fighting in Iraq first-hand. Will British recruits bring the terror home?
Every day five people die on Britain's roads - but they seldom make headlines. Is this complacency leading to a lack of justice for victims and their families? Tonight's Panorama investigates whether a change to the driving laws has seen our justice system go soft on dangerous driving and questions whether in car technology is driving us to distraction behind the wheel.
The story of one school's groundbreaking battle to save problem pupils from the scrap heap and bring exam success. Baverstock Academy is opposed to permanently excluding disruptive kids and will go to almost any lengths to keep them in mainstream education. This Panorama Special follows the students in the run-up to exams to see if the school can honour its pledge to keep disruptive pupils in school as well as get them five GCSEs.
In 2013, 146,000 kids were excluded from classrooms, 3,900 on a permanent basis. Most excluded kids end up in pupil referral units, where less than two per cent get five GCSEs at grade C. Baverstock Academy hopes its exam success will change the way the education system treats disruptive pupils and set the pattern for how these children are treated in the future.
For more than twenty years the grooming and sexual exploitation of children devastated lives in the South Yorkshire town of Rotherham. Panorama investigates why the police and council ignored warnings about the abuse that affected more than 14 hundred children. Reporter Alison Holt speaks to those who repeatedly tried to raise the alarm and hears from young people and their families, demanding to know why they weren't protected.
Vladimir Putin stands accused of launching an undeclared war against Ukraine. He has wrong-footed NATO and western diplomats. His rebel allies may well have the blood of the 298 passengers of flight MH17 on their hands but Putin has gambled boldly, playing on Europe's divisions. As fears of a wider war grow, reporter John Sweeney challenges the Russian strongman on the killing in Ukraine.
In the week Scotland goes to the ballot box, reporter Allan Little explores what has happened in the past four decades to transform the question of Scottish independence and how it has come to dominate British politics.
In the aftermath of Scotland's referendum, Panorama follows the lives of ordinary voters who took part in the momentous decision.
For seven weeks Hamas rockets roared over the border into Israel while Israeli bombs pounded Gaza. Panorama's Jane Corbin goes deep into the underground tunnels where battles have been fought to investigate the war that has devastated Gaza.
What has each side really gained in this war and can there be a solution to the conflict which is fuelling hatred and fear all over the world?
Every year in the UK, four thousand babies are stillborn. It's one of the worst rates in the developed world. Panorama's Paul Kenyon meets the clinicians who say they could save hundreds of babies' lives a year, with cheap and simple interventions that the medical establishment appears slow to accept.
Millions of British workers are being paid too little to live on - and some are on such low wages they can't afford to eat properly. Reporter Richard Bilton meets workers on the breadline who only get by because of big handouts from the government. These benefits for the low paid are now costing taxpayers £28 billion a year, so why do so many British workers find it impossible to pay their own way?
Ukip and its people's army have shaken the political establishment by attracting voters and defecting Tory MPs. It has been an extraordinary year for the once-fringe party. Reporter Darragh MacIntyre has been on the trail of the charismatic and controversial leader who claims he's revolutionising British politics, but is Nigel Farage really any different from the politicians he criticises?
On the eve of the withdrawal from Afghanistan of most American, British and other NATO forces, Panorama has gained unique access inside a Taliban stronghold just 60 miles from the capital Kabul.
Nagieb Khaja, who has reported from Afghanistan for ten years, makes a journey behind the Taliban front lines to reveal a hidden and dangerous world, where once again the writ of the Taliban runs enforcing strict sharia law and education for boys only. It is from here the Taliban are now targeting the capital itself.
In a world exclusive, Panorama tells the story of a paralysed man who is able to walk again after a pioneering transplant using the regenerative cells that repair and renew our sense of smell.
The integrity of greyhound racing has been called into question by a Panorama investigation which has exposed blatant cheating and the drugging of dogs at the heart of the sport.
The undercover investigation caught a trainer revealing how he dopes greyhounds in order to effect betting coups - some of which he claims to have paid out up to £150,000.
The programme's findings have prompted animal welfare campaigners to call for the government to reconsider the sport's self-regulatory status.
Eleven years on from the disappearance of Blackpool schoolgirl Charlene Downes, Panorama investigates why nobody has been brought to justice for her murder. Reporter Shelley Jofre unravels a story of serious failings in the police investigation and asks should more be done to protect vulnerable girls from grooming and sexual exploitation.
For decades, Mazher Mahmood exposed various personalities in the News of the World whilst posing as a fake sheikh. But after the collapse of the drugs trial of pop star Tulisa Contostavlos, a judge accused Mahmood of lying. Now, Panorama's John Sweeney speaks to some of his highest profile targets and the men who helped him expose them. They allege that the Fake Sheikh was the real crook, using sophisticated entrapment and even creating crimes and fabricating evidence.
NHS doctors and nurses have been working on the front line against Ebola in clinics in West Africa. Panorama spent a month in Sierra Leone with British-born Dr Javid Abdelmoneim filming his every moment working at a treatment centre run by the charity MSF. Using specially adapted cameras, Dr Javid records the physical and emotional impact of this deadly virus on whole families and on the medical staff treating them. Even in these desperately difficult circumstances there are moments of euphoria as patients who have been cured leave the centre.
The banks we bailed out are supposed to be supporting British business, but RBS and Lloyds have been accused of wrecking good companies. Reporter Andrew Verity meets the entrepreneurs who say their businesses have been unfairly shut down. He also hears new revelations from a former Government insider on the power and influence of Britain's biggest banks.
Panorama reveals harrowing footage and other evidence of domestic violence incidents that now account for a third of all recorded assaults with injury in England and Wales. Filmed by police response teams equipped with body-worn video cameras, this new style of evidence gathering is helping to bring perpetrators to justice. But years of coercive control and terror often lie behind the violence. Panorama hears from wives, mothers and children who have also endured non-violent domestic abuse, which is now likely to be made a criminal offence in its own right.
Panorama investigates whether an innocent man is in prison wrongly convicted as a serial killer. Scots nurse Colin Norris, dubbed the Angel of Death, is serving a minimum of 30 years in prison for the murder of four elderly patients and the attempted murder of a fifth. It was a case that captivated the nation.
Reporter Mark Daly reveals new evidence that casts serious doubt on his convictions, and could pave the way for him to be set free. Drawing on new scientific research the programme critically examines the main components of the case against Norris, and asks whether the alleged victims actually died from natural causes. Is this the first case in British history of a wrongfully convicted serial killer?
Apple is the most valuable brand on the planet, making products that everyone wants - but how are its workers treated when the world isn't looking? Panorama goes undercover in China to show what life is like for the workers making the iPhone 6. And it's not just the factories. Reporter Richard Bilton travels to Indonesia to find children working in some of the most dangerous mines in the world. But is the tin they dig out by hand finding its way into Apple's products?
