Archant’s new investigations unit has already secured 20 front-page splashes and looks to be extended beyond a nine-month trial period.

The team was launched two months ago and has three full-time journalists and three reporters who work for it one day a week.

The unit’s most extensive work has been on the blood contamination scandal, which saw NHS patients contract HIV and Hepatitis C as a result of blood transfusions in the 1970s and 1980s. According to Archant it has caused more than 2,000 deaths to date.