Eight major investigations spanning corporate misconduct, worker exploitation, aged care failures, and patient harm. Stories that triggered Royal Commissions, changed Australian law, and held power to account.
Systemic failures in Australia's childcare sector
The most decorated journalism of 2025 — exposing shocking cases of child abuse, neglect, and injury in Australian childcare centres, and the systemic failures that allowed them.
Emergency regulatory reviews nationwide
ABC Four Corners & 7.30
The crisis deepens — childcare failures continue
The follow-up investigation revealing that the childcare crisis had deepened rather than abated — despite the earlier exposure and promised reforms.
Follow-up to Betrayal of Trust
ABC Four Corners
Each investigation draws on hundreds of documents, internal communications, and interviews with whistleblowers, victims, and industry insiders.
Stories are published simultaneously across print and broadcast — maximising reach and making it impossible for the subjects to quietly manage the fallout.
A single broadcast is rarely enough. These investigations include sustained follow-up reporting that tracks whether promised reforms actually happen.
The goal is not just to expose — but to change. These investigations have triggered Royal Commissions, Senate inquiries, regulatory action, and legislative reform.
“The most decorated journalist of her generation — whose investigations have changed Australian law and held the country's most powerful institutions to account.”
These eight major investigations represent the core of Adele Ferguson's work. The full journalism archive includes additional stories, commentary, and analysis.