Our in-depth investigations hold the powerful to account.
But this vital work is only possible with your support.
Join us in the hard pursuit of truth. Become a Bureau Insider with a monthly donation.
(Got questions about Insider membership? Read our FAQ).
TBIJ’s membership community.
Our Insiders donate to TBIJ every month because they believe investigative journalism is vital to keeping democracy alive. The money they contribute supports our investigations, helping us to expose injustice and spark change.
To secure more sustainable funding, and to involve our audience more deeply in our work.
TBIJ was founded in 2010 by pioneering journalist Elaine Potter, and got its start thanks to funding from the David & Elaine Potter Foundation. Since then, our work has been paid for primarily by philanthropic trusts and foundations around the world. In the past, 95% of our income has come from these grant-giving organisations, with about 5% coming from smaller individual donations.
But things are changing in a big way: Brexit has made the UK less attractive to foundations giving money from other parts of the world, and made it harder to access funds focused on supporting EU initiatives. Covid-19 led many organisations to reevaluate the projects they give cash to. Inflation and the cost of living crisis mean many foundations are giving less, while more organisations looking for investment has created a very competitive market.
All this means TBIJ is seeing a sizable drop in the amount of cash we get from trusts and foundations, and we now face a funding shortfall. It costs about £2.7m a year to run TBIJ. To keep going in 2024, we currently need to find £450,000. By expanding the pool of people who support TBIJ’s work, we hope to secure a more sustainable source of funding.
This will help TBIJ to not only survive but thrive. Our future plans include investigating even more subjects, in even more countries, and sharing findings with our audience in innovative, exciting ways that bring you into the very heart of our investigations.
You need to donate monthly to become a Bureau Insider, but how much you donate each month is up to you. We operate a “pay what you choose” model to keep Insiders accessible to everyone.
The average donation is £10 a month.
Rigorous, in-depth investigative journalism that drives real-world impact. Your contribution means we can keep doing work that exposes injustice and sparks change in 2024 and beyond.
Over the coming months, we will also be offering Insiders various ways to find out more about how our work gets done, such as Insiders events and newsletters. Watch this space.
No. We want TBIJ’s work to have as much impact as possible, so our public interest journalism will always remain free to access on our website.
Your contribution helps us to produce investigations that benefit everyone.
TBIJ is the UK’s largest not-for-profit newsroom, so every single pound you give will be ploughed back into our newsroom to produce unique, independent journalism with real-world impact.
TBIJ’s budget covers salaries of the all staff who make our investigations possible, including reporters, editors, fact-checkers, impact producers, community organisers, fundraisers, audience specialists, and the operations and finance team who take care of them all. The budget also pays for office costs,; the IT, staff training, and travel needed for cutting-edge reporting; and legal costs when our journalism is challenged by the rich and powerful.
Each year we will report back to our Insiders on how TBIJ has spent its budget.
No problem. We understand that circumstances change. You can log in to your Insiders members area here to amend, pause, or cancel your membership at any time. If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected]
