Dear readers — it’s New-Years-Eve-Morning, and you’re likely bracing yourselves for the night ahead, and the year that follows, and the whole new set of trials, delights, and hangovers the pair of them may bring. Perhaps you need something to take your mind off it all. Perhaps your New Years Resolution this time last year was to read more long form journalism. Both of these are great reasons to have a peruse through this, our list of favourite Mill stories from 2025, as chosen by The Mill cast and crew themselves. We hope you like them as much as we do, and please comment your own favourite stories below, especially if it’s one we’ve missed out. See you next year, godspeed.
Joshi Herrmann's favourite stories
This story was just one part of Mollie’s investigation (the most recent update is here), which has led to a police investigation into suspected “fraud and bribery”, home searches, the suspension of the vice chancellor and other senior officials and several mentions in parliament. Earlier this month it even won a British Journalism Award. It’s one of the most impactful pieces of investigative journalism we've ever published, and like much of our work, it began with a Mill reader getting in touch and saying a version of ‘something isn’t right here - can you look into it?’
Mollie Simpson
A death on the streets of Withington
I decided that I wasn’t going to read our stories while I was on my honeymoon earlier this year, but I made an exception for this piece because I knew it would be really special. Jack wrote about Paul Jackson, a man who died while sleeping rough, and he wrote about him not as a “homeless person” but as a person: someone with friends and plans for his life. I wasn’t surprised to see it getting a huge reaction online, especially on Instagram. “I never knew you Paul but after reading this I will always remember you,” one reader wrote. “Thinking of you Paul,” wrote another. “Sweet dreams.”
On their holiest day, Manchester’s Jews face their ‘darkest of moments’
The appalling attack on a synagogue in Crumpsall was perhaps the darkest moment in the city this year. At first, I sent one reporter out to find out what was going on, and within an hour or so, we had the whole Mill team working on it. I thought the piece they produced was extremely moving, notably Ophira’s encounter with the women praying in a makeshift synagogue nearby. Ophira then followed it up with a beautiful piece about her family and the relations between Jews and Muslims in the area.
Lucy McLaughlin's favourite stories
Backstabbing, crying and a ‘web of deceit’: Inside the fight to get into Trafford’s grammar schools
No other article sparked quite as much fervour in the comments as Ophira’s piece on Trafford’s grammar schools did — and for good reason. Having attended one of them myself, I’ll admit that it felt, at times, a little too close to home. But whether you agree that they’re a “middle-class racket” as one teacher puts it, or think they grant “talented children from financially poor families” the chance to seize otherwise unlikely opportunities, it’s one of those pieces that you’re guaranteed to keep thinking about for months after reading.
Ophira Gottlieb
F1 pit stops for Deliveroo riders: our convenience-obsession has created a new kind of bike shop
In this piece, Jack revealed how a Sudanese man named John identified a “gap in the market” created by swathes of delivery riders in need of cheap, quick bike repairs to protect their livelihoods. We meet Saad, Izzadin, Lee, Hassan, Khalil and Ahmad as they visit the F1-pit-stop-style bike shops, before many of them take off again in below-freezing temperatures to deliver our meals around the city. Not only is it a side of Manchester I didn’t know existed, but it’s also one of the most poignant reads I’ve encountered all year, handled with the exacting tenderness it deserves.
Manchester’s chief flag-raiser has put his people smuggling days behind him
When flags appeared across the country at the back end of summer, what they represented became a talking point that gripped the nation. But nobody was looking into the people behind the movement — until, that is, Jack Walton started snooping around, and uncovered some pretty startling revelations about the city’s flag-raising figurehead. It’s a striking example of delving beyond the headlines to reveal insights that cut through the noise, and his reporting sparked a collaborative follow-up with our sister publications across the country, as well as a somewhat ill-mannered voicemail from Lee Twamley himself.
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Jack Dulhanty's favourite stories
Meet Reform UK’s first Greater Manchester councillor
Alan Hopwood - military man, actor, biker and local Reform councillor - is hilariously rendered in this profile by Jack Walton. He and Hopwood spent a day dirt-biking around the councillor’s farmland (there was a classic picture of Hopwood, moments after being flung off his bike, that I particularly enjoyed). It’s an insight into how Reform UK pushed its way into parts of Greater Manchester, while remaining a brilliantly-written portrait of a local figure.
Jack Walton
Some say the Hotspur Press is Manchester’s oldest mill. Does it matter?
Ophira’s first story about Hotspur Press, on the efforts of conservationists to have the building listed and prevent its development, was a classic tale of Manchester’s heritage being jeopardised by commercial interests. It also took on an air of prophecy when the building burnt down a few months after. I remember seeing the smoke through the window of our office, then trying to catch up with Ophira as she disappeared out of the doorway to run over there. She was on the phone to the architect before the flames were out, who said his new student tower would rise phoenix-like from the ashes.
Inside Manchester’s tour guide turf wars
One of our most successful stories of the year, Ophira’s odyssey into the psychodramas, physical clashes and politics of Manchester’s tour guiding industry is a classic example of The Mill’s journalism: nuanced, revealing and a delight to read. The story, reported over a few weeks, was one of those pieces that the Mill office gets drip-fed by the writer over time before it’s published, hearing little snippets of who pushed who off what bench, and golden quotes here and there. But none of that took away from the finished product. It also looked fantastic in print.
Jack Walton's favourite stories
The Chippy King of Bolton has bigger fish to fry
Ophira goes to meet a man to talk about chips and winds up indulging in the prospect of a romantic future with Bolton fish-frier Tasos Pattichis, in which they start a chippy (and a family) in Pakistan. Here it is: “Yes, I can just see us now, fresh off the Tasos Tour coach and straight into the smack-hot air of Islamabad: Ophira Gottlieb and Tasos Pattichis, salt of the earth Brits not born exactly but bred, bringing with us the British identity and British ideals that our British parents instilled in us just as soon as they passed their citizenship tests”. Very touching, you will all agree.
The multi-part James Binks investigation
One of our most recent investigations, and the latest example of the impact of having robust local journalism holding power to account in our city. Without Jack Dulhanty’s work, an internal report about James Binks, which found he had acted inappropriately towards a junior female colleague while he worked at Manchester City Council, would never have come to light. Binks would still be in post as the chief executive of Rochdale Council (on a salary close to £200,000) and the HR executive in Manchester who knew about the incident but did nothing about it would still be in his job too. Thankfully, that’s no longer the case.
Jack Dulhanty
Elon Musk thinks there is a hidden grooming scandal in Oldham. Why can’t the police find it?
The Mill started reporting on Raja Miah and his claims that the local authorities and police covered up the mass grooming of white girls by Asian men in Oldham back in 2021. At the time he had a big impact - his information war led to the dismissal of a council leader in Oldham - but he was ultimately a fairly fringe figure with a small online following, little known outside of Oldham itself. Then, earlier this year, the richest man on the planet Elon Musk stepped in, amplifying Miah’s claims before hundreds of millions of people and turning them into a major national talking point. This story, by Joshi, is a great example of how journalism can cut through the frenzy.
Ophira Gottlieb's favourite stories
Inside GMP’s race to find the Salford torso killer
I know this isn’t a very Christmassy choice but hear me out. While coverage of the murder of Stuart Everett by his housemate Marcin Majerkiewicz was widespread across the UK — no one covered it like Jack D, who went behind the scenes and spoke to superintendent Lewis Hughes about the case of the “heavy bag man”. Even as someone who loathes True Crime, and squirms at any gruesome reporting, I was gripped by this one.
Finding my religion: on the road with the martyrs of Bilbao
It’s possible that I enjoyed this piece so much because of Jack W sending me live updates as the chaos unfolded (until he lost his phone that is). In signature Walton style, he makes a piece about Manchester United fandom as ridiculous as possible: by travelling to Bilbao for the Europa League final, losing his phone (which held his hotel passkey, and train tickets), getting some sort of bizarre finger infection, and being called a “queer” by a bunch of Spurs fans. “Oh yeah, the match,” he writes. “They lost obviously.”
Andrea Ashworth wrote a classic of Mancunian literature. Why did she vanish from view?
And finally, here’s the only freelance piece to make the list. In what one reader described as a “really excellent piece of literary detective work”, Mill regular David Barnett tracked down Andrea Ashworth, Mancunian author of Once in a House on Fire. Turns out she’s living in LA, doing humanitarian work for girls and women. The piece became a Mill-reader favourite. I’d love to say it made me buy the book and that I read it and it changed my life, but I haven’t actually got round to that yet. It’s on the to-do list for 2026.
David Barnett
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Did we miss out your favourite story? Strongly agree or disagree with our selection? Let us know in the comment section. And of course, have a wonderful end to your year, and start to the next!
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