‘Drug Trial Moment of Horror’ to ‘European Health Tourist Scam’: Investigative Journalism and Other Merits of the Tabloids

Abstract

This chapter focuses on the good things that the tabloids have done, most of all the genuine investigative journalism over many decades that has permitted the public to learn things that certain powerful interests would have preferred to keep hidden. Specific matters examined include a series of health scares, slum accommodation, individual politicians’ dishonourable or even illegal behaviour, and the recent cases of sex grooming gangs and inadequate police investigations. Also considered are the widely different attitudes towards welfare benefits recipients by papers that support either the Conservative or Labour parties. The language of the tabloids is examined to reveal the linguistic techniques used to present themselves as defenders of the common (wo)man who are in tune with the concerns of ordinary men and women.