Spotlight

BBC Spotlight reporter Mandy McAuley meets people across Northern Ireland facing financial hardship and poverty as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic

Northern Ireland has a new post-Brexit trade border in the Irish Sea which unionists want scrapped, but some businesses spot opportunity. Jim Fitzpatrick examines the politics and the economics.

Conor Spackman speaks to experts and those receiving vaccinations, and asks if we can be sure this lockdown is the last.

With an independent inquiry looming, Lyndsey Telford reports on what happened inside Northern Ireland’s mother and baby homes, investigates the legality of cross-border adoptions, and hears exclusively from a Protestant home survivor.

A brutal murder and a community in fear. Jennifer O’Leary investigates one of Northern Ireland’s largest criminal gangs – one which trades in drugs and murder but stands under the banner of loyalism - South East Antrim UDA.

On the anniversary of the UK’s first lockdown, families pay tribute to over 2,000 people who have lost their lives to Covid in Northern Ireland.

Topical TV debate with Jim Fitzpatrick. Panellists are MLAs Gordon Lyons and Matthew O’Toole, MP John Finucane, Conservative Peer Peter Lilley and Independent TD Verona Murphy.

Jim Fitzpatrick & Mark Devenport discuss where Northern Ireland is headed after 100 years

The Prime Minister, Taoiseach and others help former BBC NI political editor Mark Devenport chart his way through Northern Ireland’s century. One hundred years after the partition of Ireland, he speaks with some who suffered during our contentious past and others who will decide our uncertain future. Plus the results of a major opinion poll assessing the views of the public, on both sides of the border, on what lies ahead.

From Bobby Storey’s funeral to protests like Black Lives Matter, the response to Covid-19 posed unexpected questions about the PSNI’s behaviour. As society emerges from lockdown restrictions, Jennifer O’Leary investigates how the pandemic - along with the Irish Sea border - exposed tensions over policing.

How a one pound deal for public land on the scenic Causeway Coast put an ardent unionist and a staunch republican on the same side of a planning fight. Conor Spackman investigates.

With the drive for Scottish independence gathering pace, Jim Fitzpatrick asks voters there what the latest election results mean for the future of the UK – and he explores how an independent Scotland might affect Northern Ireland’s place in the union.

With next year’s assembly election on a knife-edge and a sea border seen to threaten the integrity of the union, Lyndsey Telford examines how unionism can find a way forward.

Libya helped arm the IRA, and for two decades victims have sought compensation from the African country. Reporter Stephen Dempster investigates the political obstacles thrown up in their path and why their pleas for government intervention have not been heard.

On the panel: DUP’s Gavin Robinson, UUP’s Doug Beattie, Sinn Fein’s Conor Murphy, Alliance’s Naomi Long and SDLP’s Nichola Mallon

Get up to date on the issues of the day – join Jim Fitzpatrick for challenging questions and answers in Spotlight Special’s TV debate programme.

New allegations against former Belfast Trust consultant neurologist Dr Michael Watt, at the centre of Northern Ireland’s biggest patient recall. And with investigations under way, will patients and families get the answers they want? Conor Spackman investigates.

Around 20,000 people in Northern Ireland may have long Covid. Stephen Dempster hears the compelling stories of four sufferers and asks what Stormont is doing to provide specialist services to help

As the Taliban advanced on Kabul and Western forces fled, a Northern Ireland naval officer fought from afar to rescue his interpreter's family. Jim Fitzpatrick hears of their dramatic escape and arrival in Ireland, and meets others from here for whom Afghanistan's fate is a deep concern.

As the price of puppies has rocketed during lockdown, illicit dealers from Ireland have flooded the British market with sick and dying dogs. Mandy McAuley investigates how puppies are trafficked through NI for big cash returns and confronts one of the sellers.

A gold mine, the promise of jobs and a community divided. As a planning decision on a Tyrone gold mine draws nearer, Lyndsey Telford investigates the potential economic benefits, the environmental risks and the growing rift between supporters and objectors in a rural community.

Mandy McAuley investigates how rising energy prices and limits on government support may mean a winter of hard choices for the deprived.

Conor Spackman investigates what happened when the pandemic hit care homes and examines the case for Northern Ireland to have its own public inquiry into the response to Covid-19.

Mid and East Antrim Council is in crisis. Police have launched an investigation and raided its offices. Jim Fitzpatrick investigates what has led to this unprecedented situation.

With government plans to bring in an effective amnesty for Troubles-related offences here, Stephen Dempster reports on the reaction of victims and former soldiers affected and what it could mean for how we deal with the past in Northern Ireland.

At a key point in the pandemic, the government signed a £107 million deal to buy PPE from a NI sweet company. Lyndsey Telford investigates what happened next, and how a box of kit that cost the taxpayer £1,000 came to be sold for just a fiver.