Datshiane Navanayagam is an award-winning investigative journalist and versatile broadcaster, working across both television and radio. Datshiane has reported for all the UK’s flagship current affairs programmes, including BBC Panorama, Channel 4 Dispatches and Unreported World and ITV’s Tonight. She also reports for BBC Countryfile on stories affecting rural communities. Her 2018 film for Channel 4 Dispatches ‘Working and Homeless’ told the story of Britain’s hidden crisis of working people forced to sleep on the streets due to high rents. Her 2020 BBC Panorama exposed the hidden traps of the government’s shared ownership scheme and her 2023 ITV Tonight looked at Britain’s renting crisis where she grilled the then Secretary of State for Housing, Michael Gove, on the government’s record....
Datshiane Navanayagam is an award-winning investigative journalist and versatile broadcaster, working across both television and radio.
Datshiane has reported for all the UK’s flagship current affairs programmes, including BBC Panorama, Channel 4 Dispatches and Unreported World and ITV’s Tonight. She also reports for BBC Countryfile on stories affecting rural communities.
Her 2018 film for Channel 4 Dispatches ‘Working and Homeless’ told the story of Britain’s hidden crisis of working people forced to sleep on the streets due to high rents. Her 2020 BBC Panorama exposed the hidden traps of the government’s shared ownership scheme and her 2023 ITV Tonight looked at Britain’s renting crisis where she grilled the then Secretary of State for Housing, Michael Gove, on the government’s record.
As a child, Datshiane was homeless with her family, and experienced homelessness again in her twenties. She says this experience helped cement her desire to become a journalist, telling stories that are important, relevant and give a voice to those who aren’t always represented – particularly around Britain’s housing crisis.
On radio, Datshiane is a regular reporter for BBC Radio 4’s flagship current affairs strand, File on 4 Investigates. Her 2023 programme exposed the existence of modern slavery in the UK’s care sector, winning the Human Trafficking Foundation’s Anti-Slavery Day Awards for ‘Best Broadcast Piece’ at the Houses of Parliament.
She presents The Conversation on the BBC World Service: a weekly programme which puts two extraordinary women in the spotlight, interviewing them on a shared experience or expertise. Her programmes have featured a range of experiences from Oscar nominated film directors to women who’ve experienced suicide loss. Datshiane has been praised for her sensitive and empathetic interviewing with the Radio Times calling one programme, speaking to two women coming to terms with their families’ history of enslaved and enslaver ancestors, ‘a cathartic and moving listen.’
Datshiane is also a warm and engaging live broadcaster who’s presented Woman’s Hour and The Media Show on BBC Radio 4 and Weekend Breakfast and Drive on BBC 5 Live.
In 2016 the radio critic Gillian Reynolds praised Datshiane’s series of One to One on BBC Radio 4 where she explored education and social mobility with Scottish crime writer, Val McDermid, and saxophonist, Soweto Kinch, saying “Navanayagam is a broadcaster to listen out for.”
