The lesson for journalism from the VW diesel test scandal: get help

The revelation that one of the world’s largest and most trusted businesses has been deliberately cheating on environmental tests has rocked the automative industry. It is a classic case of what I have written about elsewhere as the benefits of transparency for all organisations. Ethics is as important now as economics. But it is also a significant moment for journalism. This scandal was revealed by an engineer working for a small, specialist environmental agency not an investigative hack or an automative industry specialist journalist. This is the future of news.