PODCAST

File on 4 Investigates

BBC Radio 4

News-making original journalism documentary series, investigating stories at home and abroad.

society & culture documentary

All Episodes

37:53

I accused a policeman of rape but I ended up on trial

File on 4 Investigates ·

2026/01/27

When a woman reported an allegation of rape against a serving police officer, she found herself in the dock, charged with perverting the course of justice. File on 4 Investigates hears how she went from being a potential victim to a suspect accused of lying. Over the past decade, hundreds of rape complainants in England and Wales have been investigated for making false allegations. The programme examines when and why the justice system turns on those who come forward, and asks whether the safeguards

37:46

Thin on Information? Hair loss drug Finasteride

File on 4 Investigates ·

2026/01/20

File on 4 Investigates whether the risks associated with the popular hair loss drug Finasteride are understood, after a 2024 review by UK drug safety regulator the MHRA prompted by a lack of awareness of the drug’s side-effects. Finasteride’s most common side effects are reduced libido and erectile dysfunction, affecting more than one in a hundred patients. Some people also report low mood and suicidal thoughts. As Johnny I'Anson discovers some hair loss clinics are failing to adequately warn

37:47

No Win No Fee... No thanks?

File on 4 Investigates ·

2026/01/13

File on 4 Investigates reveals new data showing a significant rise in housing disrepair claims, now a growing market for unscrupulous No Win No Fee lawyers. Adrian Goldberg asks, has the Solicitors Regulation Authority learned its lessons from the collapse of the law firm SSB which left hundreds of householders with huge legal bills, and are they able to protect vulnerable social housing tenants from potentially risky NWNF claims? File on 4 Investigates have been told by 5 major housing providers

37:33

Can cash grants help end homelessness?

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/12/30

Do you give homeless people cash? Many people fear any donation will be misspent but a ground-breaking study in the UK is currently recruiting 125 homeless people to receive a large one-off cash payment, paid directly to them. There's no restrictions on what they can buy with the money. It can be used for anything, it’s entirely up to the individual how they choose to spend it. The aim of the project is to see if it will help people move on from homelessness for good. With exclusive access to the

37:53

Firefighting's forever chemical legacy

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/12/16

Industrial firefighting foams are an essential part of on-site safety in UK factories. But for decades some of these familiar canisters contained potentially dangerous, toxic chemicals. File on 4 Investigates discovers that 3M the multi-billion dollar chemical company responsible for producing the chemicals knew about the risks as early as the 1960s because their own internal studies on animals and tests on workers indicated a possible increase in rates of cancer. Despite this, the company failed

37:44

An unholy row over bishop accused of bullying.

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/12/09

Anne Dyer is a trailblazer - becoming the first female Bishop in the Scottish Episcopal Church when she was appointed more than seven years ago. But since then, accusations of bullying and misconduct have dominated her period in charge - even for a time leading to her suspension and calls for her resignation. Bishop Dyer denies any wrongdoing, while the church itself acknowledges there are deep wounds within the diocese of Aberdeen and Orkney. Now File on 4 Investigates has discovered new complaints

37:50

Adoption: The Blame Game

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/11/28

File on 4 Investigates discovers a world of lies and blame within adoption in the UK. The BBC has conducted the most extensive Freedom of Information request ever into adoptions that have broken down, finding that more than 1,000 adopted children in the UK have returned to care in the past five years. That is much higher than the figure in a recent government report - but the true number is likely to be even larger, as only a third of authorities said they collected this data as standard practice

37:39

Multi-Cancer Testing - Hype or Hope?

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/11/25

Multi cancer detection tests or MCDs can detect many cancers through a simple blood test. Many detect fragments of cancerous DNA that have broken off a tumour and are circulating in the blood. They can often then identify where the cancer may be. The NHS is currently involved in the words largest trial of one such test. The Galleri test is made by US firm Grail and the company says its mission is to detect cancer early when it can be cured. Heavyweight investors include Jeff Bezos and Bill

37:46

The IT bug that's caused chaos in the courts

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/11/11

An ambitious plan to digitalize the courts was meant to remove the need for hundreds of thousands of paper documents. But File on 4 Investigates has discovered an IT system, introduced as part of a £1bn project, has been plagued with technical faults - causing crucial information to go missing, be overwritten, or appear lost. The government body that runs the courts in England and Wales has now checked hundreds of thousands of benefit and child support appeals to identify if any were affected by

38:00

Chemsex: Hidden Pleasures, Hidden Harms

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/11/04

File on Four explores the risks some gay men are taking by habitually mixing their sex lives with drug use. The practice, known as Chemsex has been on the gay scene for more than a decade. It involves taking illegal and addictive substances like Crystal Meth and GHB.While the programme hears from some who say they can manage their use and it heightens their sexual pleasure, others are falling into destructive patterns of addiction, decline and even death. Reporter Mobeen Azhar tries to assess

37:09

High Stakes: Gambling in the armed forces

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/10/28

File on 4 Investigates examines the scale of problem gambling in the armed forces and the devastating impact on those serving, veterans and their families. A new study seen exclusively by the team reveals nearly half of naval trainees who gambled were at risk of harm. This latest research builds on a growing body of evidence that points to a hidden problem across the forces that’s on the rise. We ask if the MOD is aware of the challenge and if it’s doing enough to help those in need.Reporter:

36:40

Abused for Our Food

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/10/22

When journalist Georgie Styles is sent unpublished videos of farm workers in Britain being ‘treated like animals’, she begins to investigate the dark side of our food system.She uncovers numerous referrals of labour exploitation, and hears allegations of workers living in moldy caravans, being trafficked, verbally abused and forced to urinate in bottles.Her year-long investigation goes from farm workers to our favourite supermarkets.With gripping first-person testimony, unheard recordings and new

37:37

Youth Justice: The project keeping young offenders...

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/10/07

A van selling coffee and sandwiches from an office car park doesn’t sound like anything special, but there’s one in Swindon helping to keep young offenders out of custody. It’s part of an approach being deployed across the country trying to prevent young people from reoffending by encouraging a shift in their identity. The idea is to get to know the young offender, figure out what makes them tick. And then, instead of locking them up, find ways of getting them involved in whatever interests them

37:22

Swiped. Inside London's phone theft epidemic

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/09/30

Up to 80,000 phones were stolen in London’s streets and transport network in 2024, according to the Metropolitan Police. As File on 4 Investigates discovers, gangs are targeting unlocked phones. We discover that if a phone is unlocked, criminals may be able to access online banking and cryptocurrency accounts within minutes. We hear from one victim who lost £15,000 from a phone stolen from his pocket, another who lost £40,000 in cryptocurrency and about the financial and emotional cost of trying to

38:26

Inside the Migrant Hotel

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/09/22

It's a familiar story from the outside. Around 32,000 people are housed in migrant hotels around the UK and protests outside them have been violent and vocal.Sue Mitchell has spent the summer getting to know a different side of the story - what life is like Inside the migrant hotels - and she's seen and heard some striking things:Families who have been seeking asylum for nearly a decade;, a stream of prepaid taxis taking migrants to medical appointments and transporting them across the UK, families

37:16

A Prison Inspector Calls

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/09/16

In a broadcasting first, the BBC has followed a team from His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons as it investigates conditions in a prison near Rugby in Warwickshire. The result is a unique insight into the problems faced by the prison system. This portrait of a prison on trial reveals how under-resourced prison staff are failing to stop copious amounts of drugs being brought in, and are struggling to provide a safe and productive environment in which prisoners can be prepared for release back

36:40

Sex Offenders:The Long Way Back

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/09/02

Alison Holt, BBC social affairs editor, has been given exceptional access to the clients of a Nottingham charity that works to reintegrate men who have been convicted of sexual offences. 'John, Matt, Dan and Liam', not their real names, are determined to turn their lives around after prison sentences. We hear how they work towards this with the help of the staff and volunteers at the Safer Living Foundation, the only charity of its sort in the country. Always mindful of the victims of sexual crime,

37:56

Domestic Abuse: Beyond the Checklist

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/08/26

Leila Nathoo investigates the risk assessment system for domestic abuse, and asks whether it is any longer fit for purpose.The DASH form is the gateway for victims and survivors of domestic abuse - used by the police, charities and social workers to assess people who may be at risk of domestic abuse. It is deeply embedded in the whole system and plays a central role in deciding what further support victims receive. But Leila reveals troubling evidence that DASH too often incorrectly identifies those

37:04

Rivers of Lead

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/08/19

There are over 6,000 abandoned lead mines across the UK leaking hundreds of tons of metals into our rivers each year. With climate change causing an increase in flooding, contamination is likely to get worse. Is this lead ending up in our food chain, water system and blood?Presented by Lucy Taylor and Dan AshbyProducers: Pūlama Kaufman and Kelly Windsor Burgin Researcher: Charlie WestA Bite Your Tongue production for BBC Radio 4

37:55

My Faulty Knee Replacement

File on 4 Investigates ·

2025/08/12

File on 4 Investigates reveals how surgeons had raised concerns about a faulty replacement knee eight years before its US manufacturer finally decided to withdraw it from use.Knee replacement surgery is one of the most common operations carried out by the NHS, with over 100,000 procedures carried out each year. It’s a surgical success story - but things can go wrong. Around 10,000 problematic 'NexGen' knee implants, made by the US medical tech giant Zimmer Biomet, were fitted into UK patients over

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