Russian spies? The Windrush scandal? Cambridge Analytica? Many see investigative journalism as the height of our profession, the way we best serve the nation and the democracy.

But it takes ages. And freelancers have no guaranteed income – so how can we fulfill our highest professional aspirations… and eat, keep a roof over our heads, and in sum, make a living out of it?

LFB Salon will present two distinguished speakers – Meirion Jones and Paul Lashar – both practitioners well qualified to offer and steer us towards some answers.

About the speakers

Meirion Jones is commissioning editor at the Bureau For Investigative Journalism. Before his 2016 appointment to the expanding(!) Bureau, he reported for the BBC’s Panorama and Newsnight on everything from vulture funds to bogus bomb detectors and the ‘fake Sheikh’.

He won the Daniel Pearl Award for his investigation into the dumping of toxic waste in Africa by Dutch  metals and energy giant Trafigura and the London Press Awards Scoop Of The Year Award for his part in the Jimmy Savile revelations.

Paul Lashmar, now deputy head of Journalism at City University, has worked as an investigative journalist for the Observer, the Independent On Sunday, and TV’s World In Action, Timewatch and Dispatches. His subjects included terrorism and the secret state. He has won Reporter of The Year (with David Leigh at the British Press Awards) and co-authored a text book, Online Journalism.

Cost

Price for Society of Authors members, including refreshments: £10 (including members of NUJ and sister unions BECTU, Writers’ Guild); non-members, £20.

Find out more and book tickets, or freelanceoffice@nuj.org.uk.