An independent investigative platform reporting on the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church — its commercial network, political influence, charitable structures and community impact.
In May 2020, Damian Hastie began analysing UK government contract data to understand how public money was being spent during the pandemic. He had no prior knowledge of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church. What he found, by following the contracts, was a concentrated pattern of awards to companies connected to a single family — and behind those companies, a closed religious organisation that most people in the UK had never heard of.
That research became Brethren Exposed, then Brethren Intelligence — a platform that has grown from a contract analysis into a structured intelligence database covering more than 8,000 PBCC-connected companies and 9,000 individuals across 20 countries, alongside a library of original investigations covering business, contracts, politics, charity, crime, community, planning and editorial.
The platform tracks the PBCC's commercial network — including the companies connected to the Hales family that won more than £2.5 billion in UK Covid contracts, the ATO investigation into UBT and its subsequent voluntary disclosure, the Global Advisory Panel structure, and the financial relationships between PBCC leaders, their charities and their businesses.
Investigations are based entirely on public records: Companies House filings, ASIC records, government contract databases, charity commission accounts, trademark registries, electoral records and published court proceedings. Where claims go beyond public records, they are clearly labelled as analysis or editorial.
Damian Hastie is the founder of Brethren Intelligence and the director of Open & Candid Ltd. He has no personal connection to the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church — no family members, no former membership, no financial relationships. His interest is in corporate transparency, public accountability and the accurate reporting of how public money is spent.
Brethren Intelligence does not campaign for or against any religious belief. It reports on the commercial activities, political influence and financial structures of an organisation that has received significant sums of public money and that operates with a level of opacity that we believe the public interest requires to be examined.
All factual claims in investigations are sourced to public records, which are cited or described in the article. We do not publish unverified allegations. Where we report connections between individuals and organisations, those connections are evidenced by documentary records.
Editorial pieces — clearly labelled as such — represent the personal views of the author. They are distinguished from factual investigations throughout the library.
We maintain a full Terms & Methodology page explaining our sourcing standards, how we define PBCC connections, and the basis on which we make attribution decisions.
Journalists working on stories related to the PBCC, government contracts or related matters are welcome to contact us. We can provide background, source documents and context from the database. We work on a confidential basis where required.
If you have information about PBCC-connected companies, contracts or individuals that you believe should be investigated, we want to hear from you.