Richard Orange is managing director of Orchard News Bureau Ltd, a media consultancy company specialising in local government/police authority affairs and media law.
ONB provides expert advice on the operation of national audit regulations governing access to public accounts.
Richard has already taken one local authority to the High Court over its failure to release financial data to taxpayers, and recently unearthed a corrupt land deal which led to the imprisonment of a prominent East Midlands council leader.
Richard is a senior lecturer at the Lincoln School of Journalism, an external examiner at the Cardiff School of Journalism, and a visiting lecturer at the Nottingham Centre for Broadcasting and Journalism. He has worked for a variety of regional and national newspapers and trade magazines.
At the summer school 2009 Richard gave a talk about how to go about investigating local authorities: Town Hall Finance.