7. Open the door and you’re doomed

Journalists couldn’t get to the truth with people. Some make stories possible. Others do all they can to stop them.

Revisiting difficult stories he and other journalists have had to report, BBC International Editor Jeremy Bowen looks at some of the obstacles that stand between journalists and what Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein once called the ‘best obtainable version of the truth’.

In this episode: how journalists deal with sources, spin and powerful people.

Jeremy speaks with: journalist and former BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg, Dean Baquet - until 2022 executive editor of the New York Times, BBC Gaza producer Rushdi Abu Alouf, and broadcaster and former editor of The Mirror and News of The World, Piers Morgan.

Presenter: Jeremy Bowen

Producer: Georgia Catt

Assistant Producer: Sam Peach

Additional research: Rob Byrne

Series mixing: Jackie Margerum

Series Editor: Philip Sellars