A huge moment for us

Dear readers — I hope you’re having a lovely day. I just wanted to send you a quick note about something we’re very excited about at Mill HQ.

I’m writing to tell you that our investigations into the University of Greater Manchester and associated shady financial dealings have received some major recognition at a national level.

Our reporting has made the final shortlist for the prestigious British Journalism Awards, which commends the best journalism published over the past year. Only eight journalists across the country were shortlisted for the local journalism category.

To recap: Our investigations surfaced contracts and documents showing that senior executives at the university tried to divert hundreds of thousands in tuition fees – via a university recruitment partner in Casablanca – into a private company owned by one of them, a man called Joseph Wheeler. Our reporting suggested that the vice chancellor George Holmes had been told about this deal, and despite several attempts, we could not get the university to explain why he allowed it to proceed.

We also showed that the university was paying millions of pounds to Wheeler’s tiny marketing company, despite Wheeler having no obvious background in higher education. In response to our reporting, the university suspended its vice chancellor of 20 years, George Holmes, as a result of “serious allegations”, along with the provost and another senior member of staff. Greater Manchester Police have now officially confirmed they have an “active investigation” into suspected fraud and bribery at the university, and in July, conducted a series of raids across seven properties in the UK.

Amazingly, this wasn’t the only Mill Media investigation to make the final shortlist: our sister publications The Tribune in Sheffield and The Post in Liverpool are also on the list for their work exposing the secretive facilities building the UK’s next nuclear warheads and a deeply-sourced investigation exposing the abusive behaviour of TV historian Laurence Westgaph.

Three out of eight is a pretty strong showing for a tiny company like us. Especially given that just over five years ago neither The Mill, nor any of our sister titles, existed. 

It’s beginning to look like a pattern. And that’s no surprise, because the big reason me or my colleagues can write award-nominated stuff is simple: we are given the time to do so.

We have that time because we’re backed by members, who understand that good things are worth the wait. They’re not hankering after enraging headlines every hour. They want quality, and they’re willing to invest, and wait for it to come off. They trust us — and, as we believe these nominations show, they’re right to do so.