Dispatches — 2024

May 202426m

What's the environmental impact of the UK's huge soft drink habit? With a thirsty nation getting through two billion plastic bottles a year, and the same for cans, do Coke's recycling claims stand up?

May 202426m

Potholes everywhere. Controversial Low Traffic Neighbourhoods and electric vehicle confusion too. Car journalist Ginny Buckley asks is this the worst time ever to be a motorist in the UK?

May 202426m

The story of the Israeli military assault on Gaza. Seen through the eyes of children, journalists and doctors, Dispatches takes an unflinching look at the horrific challenges and heartbreaking loss.

May 202426m

What's the story behind the runaway success of the addictive Chinese shopping app? With half a billion downloads worldwide, are some of Temu's rock-bottom prices and products too good to be true?

Jun 202446m

A look inside the lucrative world of waste crime with video, surveillance footage and interviews from insiders. Exposing how banned waste has been dumped for years in a major landfill site, seemingly unnoticed by the authorities, while posing a risk to human health. This documentary reveals new satellite data suggesting hundreds of unregulated waste dumps are being operated in plain sight and investigates evidence of the growing role of organisations engaging in illegal fly-tipping, with little fear of action against them.

Jun 20241h

Undercover report filmed over two months at an NHS Accident and Emergency Department, which exposes the suffering and dangers patients face on a daily basis. The programme features footage of seriously ill patients forced to sleep on chairs for up to two days because there are no beds, and a dangerous superbug outbreak linked to overcrowding and falling hygiene standards.

Jun 20241h

Election campaigners and experts have warned that artificial intelligence tools could risk politically motivated disinformation flooding social media feeds in ways that recently seemed unimaginable. The fear is that deepfakes and other AI-generated material could influence votes. Cathy Newman reports on the issue, illustrating the effect that AI could have on 12 households of undecided voters. The homes are fed AI-generated material advised by political experts, with the residents none the wiser. Will the experiment succeed? If so, what does it say about the power of AI to influence the vote?

Jul 202447m

Analysing police data, Dispatches reveals local hotspots where 100% of neighbourhood crimes go unsolved. The team watch a theft in action and go on the trail of the criminals.

Oct 20241h

With Barbiemania putting toy maker Mattel back in the limelight, Dispatches goes undercover in one of Mattel's factories, exposing the reality for workers making the famous dolls

Oct 202430m

The online secondhand clothes app Vinted is booming. Is its soar-away success too good to be true? Dispatches uncovers the truth behind some of the products sold on the platform.

Nov 202448m

For years, the royals kept details of some of their wealth secret. Dispatches reveals what they have kept under wraps - about who is paying them, and for what.

Nov 202447m

In this high-stakes true crime investigation, Dispatches goes undercover to expose the organised criminal networks behind the UK's shoplifting epidemic.

Dec 20241h

With the recent rise in working-age people on sickness benefits - many of them under 35 - Dispatches asks what's driving the surge?