Four Corners — Season 50
Australia's premiere current affairs programme, incisive investigative journalism.
About this season
Four Corners is Australia's longest-running investigative journalism/current affairs television program. Broadcast on ABC1 in Australia, it premiered on 19 August 1961 and celebrated its 60th anniversary in 2021. Founding producer Robert Raymond and his successor Allan Ashbolt did much to set the ongoing tone of the program. Based on the Panorama concept, the program addresses a single issue in depth each week, showing either a locally produced program or a relevant documentary from overseas. The program has won many awards for investigative journalism, and broken many high-profile stories. A notable early example of this was the show's epoch-making 1962 exposé on the appalling living conditions endured by many Aboriginal Australians living in rural New South Wales.
Episodes (39)
1. A Good Death
Aired 8 February 2010 • 45 min
Four Corners follows four brave Australians as they come to the end of their lives, and the people determined to give them a good death.
2. Breaking Point
Aired 15 February 2010 • 45 min
Will Australia's flawed disability support system be reformed in time to save the families now at breaking point?
3. The Warlord's Tune
Aired 22 February 2010 • 45 min
A harrowing documentary that tells how thousands of young boys in Afghanistan are now being hunted and groomed to become sex slaves.
4. The State of Play
Aired 1 March 2010 • 45 min
The inside story of the battle to control Australian tennis.
5. Scientology: The Ex-Files
Aired 8 March 2010 • 45 min
Former members of the Church give a chilling portrait of life inside the organisation.
6. The Authentic Mr Abbott
Aired 15 March 2010 • 45 min
A revealing profile of the man who wants to be the next Prime Minister of Australia.
7. Mexico's Drug Wars
Aired 22 March 2010 • 45 min
A horrifying account of the brutal war that's raging in the towns that dot the border between Mexico and the United States.
8. Gypsy Child Thieves
Aired 29 March 2010 • 45 min
The harrowing story of the children who are forced into a life of crime on the streets in order to survive.
9. Over the Edge
Aired 5 April 2010 • 45 min
The harrowing story of the therapist whose work led some patients to believe they'd committed or been the victim of shocking sexual crimes.
10. A Dirty Business
Aired 12 April 2010 • 45 min
How the people of a once picturesque valley found themselves surrounded by coalmines, dust and toxic chemicals, while the State Government ignores their pleas for help.
11. Chinese Whispers
Aired 19 April 2010 • 45 min
Four Corners looks at events surrounding the arrest of mining executive Stern Hu and the tensions now involved in doing business with China.
12. A Lethal Miscalculation
Aired 26 April 2010 • 45 min
The story behind the Federal Government's multi-billion dollar home insulation scheme debacle.
13. Chocolate: The Bitter Truth
Aired 3 May 2010 • 45 min
An undercover investigation, spanning three continents, that exposes the way children are trafficked and used to produce the raw materials that drive a multi-billion dollar industry.
14. Access Denied
Aired 10 May 2010 • 45 min
Quentin McDermott looks at the potential impact of the Government’s mandatory filtering system.
15. In a Strange Land
Aired 17 May 2010 • 45 min
The story of a young woman's confronting journey back to the war-ravaged country of her birth.
16. Dirty Money
Aired 24 May 2010 • 45 min
In this joint investigation with The Age newspaper, Four Corners reveals how the central pillar of Australia's financial system, the Reserve Bank, became ensnared in an international bribery scandal.
17. South Africa's Lost Innocence
Aired 31 May 2010 • 45 min
South Africa has the highest incidence of rape in the world, and almost half the victims are children.
18. What's Yours Is Mine
Aired 7 June 2010 • 45 min
How the government's attempt to introduce a resource super profits tax began a war with mine bosses, split the business community and may yet derail Labor's attempt to win the next Federal election.
19. One Shitty Deal
Aired 14 June 2010 • 45 min
A story that reveals how a toxic cocktail of investment packages helped poison the retirement funds of hundreds of Australians.
20. Rush to Riches
Aired 21 June 2010 • 45 min
How an attempt to negotiate a deal to create a state of the art resources development turned sour, pitting Indigenous people against each other and some of them against the State Government.
21. Dancing with the Devil
Aired 28 June 2010 • 45 min
This story documents the intersecting lives of three men - a cop, a drug dealer and a preacher - as they struggle to survive on the backstreets of Rio de Janeiro.
22. A Careful War - Part 1
Aired 5 July 2010 • 45 min
Chris Masters delivers the first of two ground level reports giving a soldier's-eye view of the bloody war being waged against the Taliban in Afghanistan.
23. A Careful War - Part 2
Aired 12 July 2010 • 45 min
The story of Australian troops as they head into unchartered territory, trying to win the faith and trust of a brutalised people in conflict-torn Afghanistan.
24. A Dog Act
Aired 19 July 2010 • 45 min
A forensic investigation of the killing of Kwementyaye Ryder by five white, local youths from Alice Springs.
25. Heart of Darkness
Aired 26 July 2010 • 45 min
The story of a young woman's search to understand the shocking conflict that has laid waste the country where she was born.
26. Smugglers' Paradise
Aired 2 August 2010 • 45 min
An expose of people smugglers and their networks in Indonesia.
27. Hidden Voices
Aired 9 August 2010 • 45 min
The story of an Australian town that holds a lesson for each and every person who's been touched by mental illness.
28. Whatever it Takes
Aired 16 August 2010 • 45 min
A critical look at one of the closest fought Federal elections in two decades, assessing the parties, their policies and the two people who want to lead the country.
29. Overdose
Aired 23 August 2010 • 45 min
The story of the greatest financial crisis you will ever see...
30. Crime Incorporated
Aired 30 August 2010 • 45 min
A joint ABC Four Corners/Fairfax investigation that takes us inside major Australian organised crime networks.
31. Body Corporate
Aired 6 September 2010 • 45 min
The story of the high stakes battle that will decide who owns your body and the key biological building blocks that make you the person that you are.
32. After the Deluge
Aired 9 September 2010 • 45 min
The story of the high stakes battle that will decide who owns your body and the key biological building blocks that make you the person that you are.
33. Return to the Rainbow Warrior
Aired 20 September 2010 • 45 min
This week on Four Corners, "Return to the Rainbow Warrior", a story that attempts to finally get to the truth of a murderous attack that New Zealanders describe as an act of state sponsored terrorism.
34. Oxy: The Hidden Epidemic
Aired 23 September 2010 • 45 min
This week on Four Corners, Oxy: The Hidden Epidemic - a story that reveals how the misuse of powerful prescription drugs is creating a new generation of addicts.
35. The Deal
Aired 4 October 2010 • 45 min
The inside story of the historic deal that created Australia's first national minority government in seven decades.
36. Secret Iraq - Insurgency
Aired 11 October 2010 • 45 min
Part one of a startling expose revealing what really happened in Iraq after the occupation of the country by Coalition troops.
37. Secret Iraq - Awakening
Aired 18 October 2010 • 45 min
The story revealing how Coalition policy took Iraq to the brink of an all-out civil war and how key players in the U.S.
38. In a Fix
Aired 25 October 2010 • 45 min
An investigation into the allegations of corruption and match fixing that threaten to undermine the multi-billion dollar sport of international cricket.
39. Bad Call
Aired 1 November 2010 • 45 min
Everyone knows that telecommunications is a highly competitive business. Empires have been built on cheap phone calls and businesses are always looking to get a better deal from phone companies. But now Four Corners reporter Stephen Long blows the whistle on highly questionable phone deals.