UK's Bureau of Investigative Journalism to hire up to 20 new journalists

Posted by Betsey Reinsborough on November 4, 2009 at 5:30 PM

The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (BIJ) is hiring! As previously reported, the group received a £2 million grant in July from the Potter Foundation and now it appears to be looking to put the grant to use. According to journalism.co.uk, BIJ reports to be looking to recruit three to four investigative journalists to begin with, but will continue to expand as needed, potentially hiring up to twenty new journalists. It is a good day for journalists looking for work, as the Wall Street Journal announced earlier today that it will be hiring twelve new journalist for their New York division.

Those hired will likely be working in small teams on each story. This is to aide in the investigations as well as the final stories, according to Iain Overton, MD of the BIJ, who told Journalism.co.uk, "the collaborative relationships between print and TV broadcast journalists, or online and radio journalists, will help establish investigations where the quality of which will not only benefit from the different skills brought to the table, but also the end material will be better suited to be used across a wider variety of media platforms."

The BIJ will work with the newly created Investigations Fund, founded by a group of the UK's top investigators to support work in their field of journalism. Together, the BIJ hopes it will be possible to promote public interest for investigative, not-for-profit journalism as well as to create a sustainable business model for the future.

Overton is also quoted as saying that the BIJ has been inspired by the practices of the US's ProPublica, "We recognised from the outset that the ProPublica model would be difficult to reproduce due in part to the sheer magnitude of its funding... Still, it was a model we liked and were inspired by."