Recent high-profile collapses of high street names such as Comet, Phones4U and other companies have left thousands of people out of work and have cost the taxpayer millions in statutory redundancy payments and unpaid taxes. This week File on 4 goes behind the headlines to examine the role of the companies' private equity backers. Were these failed businesses which were bound to have to close? Or might they have survived for longer under different ownership? Fran Abrams investigates.
Producer: Emma Forde.
Politik
File on 4 Investigates Folgen
News-making original journalism documentary series, investigating stories at home and abroad.
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515 Folgen
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Folge vom 04.11.2014Private Equity: Winners and Losers
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Folge vom 28.10.2014The Last Taboo?As inquiries into child abuse in Rotherham continue, File on 4 investigates claims of a hidden problem of sexual abuse within Britain's Asian communities.While the victims of recent grooming scandals have mostly been white girls, campaigners say Asian boys and girls have also been subjected to abuse over many years.Male and female survivors tell Manveen Rana there's a powerful culture of denial stopping many speaking out and getting justice. They say communities too often close ranks and ostracise or threaten those who complain, while leaving perpetrators to carry on.Reporter: Manveen Rana Producer: Sally Chesworth Assistant Producer: Yasminara Khan.
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Folge vom 21.10.2014EbolaEbola is now regarded as an international threat to peace and security, according to the World Health Organisation. Yet, when the WHO was first warned of an unprecedented outbreak, the organisation said it was "still relatively small." Now the UK has asked for volunteers to travel to West Africa to try to bring Ebola under control. Thousands of American troops are also flying out to the region. But could all this have been avoided? Simon Cox asks why it took so long for the world to wake up to the threat posed by Ebola? He also investigates the treatments that are now, belatedly, being developed - treatments that have existed for decades. Vaccines and other drugs are being rushed into production at an unprecedented pace, by-passing the usual safety controls. However, all predictions are that many more people will die before the disease is brought under control. Even then, will it become endemic?Reporter: Simon Cox Producer: John Murphy.
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Folge vom 14.10.2014NHS: Testing the MarketIn the biggest outsourcing to date, the NHS in England has announced it is tendering a huge £700 million contract for providing NHS cancer care in Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent, along with another £500million for end of life care in the region. Officials say it will streamline services and provide better treatment while critics say it's the most reckless privatisation yet. BBC Health Editor Hugh Pym investigates.. Producer: Paul Grant.