Investigative journalism at 5 live
What with the MPs' expenses scandal and the 'Hackgate' controversy surrounding the News of the World, this has been a great couple of years for investigative journalism.
Both stories revealed aspects of society which the great and the good wanted hushed up, which the public devoured with an unrestrained appetite over weeks of relentless media coverage.
Critics call our trade 'muck-raking', but as these episodes proved, it's not only journos who inhabit the dung-hill.
For me, investigations are the purest form of journalism.
They honour the dictum of former Times editor Harry Evans who declared that the object of our trade is to uncover what someone, somewhere wants kept hidden.
On 5 live Investigates we aim to do justice to his words, even if the targets of our stories sometimes occupy less exalted positions than Members of Parliament or media barons.
During the last series we clashed with Nigerian conmen who posed on the internet as financially stricken US soldiers serving in Afghanistan.
Their victims were lonely middle-aged women who in some cases had been persuaded to part with thousands of pounds to help their new-found 'friends'.
Some listeners reflected on the gullibility of these lovelorn ladies, yet the world wide web of deceit had been spun so intricately that it was impossible not to feel sorry for victims who were guilty of no greater crime than being too trustworthy.
Even though we managed to track down one of these scammers and record a conversation with him, in truth there was little prospect of ever bringing him or his colleagues to justice.
Rather, the aim was to sound a cautionary note to other listeners who would hopefully avoid being ripped off in the same way.
On other occasions, a timely investigation can have a decisive influence on a story.
Acting on a tip-off just before the start of the last Premier League season, we started probing the financial affairs of Indian businessman Ahsan Ali Syed, the prospective owner of Blackburn Rovers.
Ahsan challenged us to carry out due diligence of his financial affairs - so we did.
What we uncovered about a man who boasted of a multi-million pound global business empire was remarkable.
He'd left behind a trail of debts from several years earlier when he'd lived in London, before moving to Bahrain, leaving a former landlord and his local council with unpaid bills.
These were, in some respects, petty misdemeanours, but were clearly of concern to the Blackburn board - as was the fact that Ahsan ducked our frequent interview requests.
He subsequently dropped out of the race to buy Rovers, opting instead to purchase Spanish club Racing Santander.
Within months of his arrival, Santander had been placed in administration.
Blackburn fans may not be altogether enamoured of their new owners, who own a poultry processing plant in India - but hey, it's better to be owned by chicken farmers than having your goose entirely cooked!
Already the new series is shaping up to deliver a few more uncomfortable truths.
In the opening programme, we go behind the headlines to discover the alarming truth about doctors and nurses who can't speak good English.
I've also been meeting the 'squeezed middle-classes' who are renting out the spare room - to cannabis farmers.
That's the thing with investigative journalism. You come across plenty of disreputable characters. And not all of them have been elected to the Palace of Westminster.
Adrian Goldberg presents 5 live Investigates, which returns for a new series at 21:00 on Sunday 18 September
Comment number 1.
At 02:11 18th Sep 2011, Nick Vinehill wrote:Wouldn't call it muck-raking; just very selective investigative journalism where the finished product may appeal to more impressionable disempowered listeners but whose real underlying purpose is to hush up inherently far more important details which our rulers don't want anybody to hear!
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