Katy Jones obituary

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/may/06/katy-jones

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The investigative journalist and TV producer Katy Jones, who has died suddenly following a brain haemorrhage, aged 51, helped to expose institutional injustice and human rights abuses, always focusing on the lives and experiences of those rendered powerless by their circumstances. She was also recognised as the driving force behind the BBC’s Ten Pieces project, committed to broadening the education of children and young people through music.

Katy was well known for her contribution to Jimmy McGovern’s drama-documentary Hillsborough (Granada, 1996). At an FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest held at Hillsborough stadium, Sheffield, on 15 April 1989, severe crushing in two overcrowded pens led to the deaths of 96 men, women and children. Told primarily through the experiences of three families, and informed by Katy’s meticulous research, the film increased public understanding of the context and consequences of the disaster, won major awards and achieved international recognition.

In 2010, the Labour government acceded to the Hillsborough families’ demands for a full review of all existing documents relating to the disaster. Katy was appointed to the Hillsborough Independent Panel and throughout its first months worked closely with its research team. The panel’s report was presented to the families on 12 September 2012 at the Anglican Cathedral, Liverpool. The 96 inquest verdicts were subsequently quashed and new inquests initiated, as were fresh police and Independent Police Complaints Commission investigations.

The daughter of Anne Pickard, an educationist, and Gareth Jones, a management consultant, Katy was born and grew up in Dulwich, south London. With her older brother, Christopher, and younger sister, Becky, she shared a love of her father’s home country, Wales, taking many summer holidays in the Black Mountains.

She was educated at Mary Datchelor grammar school, Alleyn’s school, Dulwich, and Brasenose College, Oxford. At university she wrote for Isis, the Oxford student magazine. Creating a more radical alternative, Katy founded and edited The Twist, an highly successful arts and cultural magazine that in 1984 was named the Guardian’s student magazine of the year. It was the first of Katy’s many awards.

Following graduation, she joined Granada TV in Manchester as a researcher, soon moving to its flagship investigative programme, World in Action. She worked on 25 programmes, including Pindown, exposing systemic child abuse in Staffordshire’s residential homes and prompting an inquiry into the authority’s institutional childcare system. Through her experience at World in Action she became convinced that broadcasting could be a positive force for change.

Related: Letter: Katy Jones helped expose brutal pindown regime at children’s homes

Appointed factual producer researching Hillsborough in 1995, she drew on the research of the Hillsborough Project, which had analysed the public inquiry and inquests, alongside interviews with bereaved families and survivors. Katy further examined key documents, and interviewed senior police officers and officials, establishing long-lasting, trusting relationships with those families whose stories were central to the production.

In 1994 Katy had married Mike Spencer, then head of Granada’s regional programmes. They went on to have two children, Huw and Sarah. While parenting and volunteering as a school governor, Katy continued her investigative work. Her research and production credits were extensive, and included McGovern’s Sunday (2002), which focused on the killing of 14 civilians by soldiers of the 1st Battalion, Parachute Regiment, in Derry’s Bogside in January 1972.

Yasmin (2004), written by Simon Beaufoy, explored the intergenerational impact of 9/11 on the British Pakistani Muslim community in West Yorkshire. The Mark of Cain (2007), written by Tony Marchant, exposed the realities of the “war on terror” through the testimonies of young soldiers in Iraq. Neil McKay’s RIP Boy (2010) for BBC Radio recounted the appalling death of Zahid Mubarek at the hands of his racist cellmate in Feltham Young Offenders’ Institution. These outstanding productions were hallmarked by Katy’s commitment to factual accuracy, passion for social justice and calm intelligence.

In 2011, while serving on the Hillsborough Independent Panel, she was appointed executive producer for the BBC’s Learning Zone, commissioning 130 educational dramas, documentaries and animations over four years. These programmes won more than 50 nominations and awards including six Baftas. Recently she devised and produced the BBC’s Ten Pieces. Introducing schoolchildren throughout Britain to classical music, Ten Pieces is an inclusive and innovative initiative encouraging children to experiment with music.

Launching the project with Katy in 2014, the BBC’s director general, Tony Hall, expressed immense pride in embarking on the corporation’s “biggest commitment we’ve ever made to music education”. As Ten Pieces develops it will form the most recent exemplar of Katy’s diverse legacy in broadcasting. She, says Hall, “stood for everything I love about the BBC – its ability to reach everyone, to bring communities and generations together, and to make a difference in people’s lives”.

Katy was a vibrant, intuitive, strong woman who challenged injustice and was an inspiration to many. Her boundless, infectious energy and her ability to understand and expose personal struggles within their defining political and institutional contexts will be profoundly missed.

She is survived by Mike, Sarah and Huw.

• Katy Jones, television journalist, born 8 August 1963; died 24 April 2015