1 00:00:03,560 --> 00:00:06,360 Welcome to Probation Perspectives insights into 2 00:00:06,360 --> 00:00:09,600 Community Justice, the podcast where we dive into the world of 3 00:00:09,600 --> 00:00:12,680 probation, rehabilitation and community justice. 4 00:00:13,040 --> 00:00:16,320 Each episode we explore the themes, challenges and skills 5 00:00:16,320 --> 00:00:18,680 that underpin effective probation practise. 6 00:00:19,520 --> 00:00:21,960 Whether you're just starting out on the P quip, have years of 7 00:00:21,960 --> 00:00:24,280 experience in the field, or are simply curious about the 8 00:00:24,280 --> 00:00:27,280 criminal justice system, this podcast is your space for 9 00:00:27,280 --> 00:00:30,040 practical insight, expert perspectives, and meaningful 10 00:00:30,040 --> 00:00:33,320 conversations. In today's episode, we're joined 11 00:00:33,320 --> 00:00:36,800 by Andy Briley, Senior Lecturer and editor of The Good Prison 12 00:00:36,800 --> 00:00:40,440 Officer, a book that challenges us to rethink what effective and 13 00:00:40,440 --> 00:00:43,840 ethical prison practise looks like in today's justice system. 14 00:00:44,960 --> 00:00:47,960 Having an impact on how someone feels about you is how to 15 00:00:47,960 --> 00:00:50,920 develop trust in relationships. Not how clever you are or how 16 00:00:50,920 --> 00:00:53,920 robotic you are in doing the risk assessment processes, but 17 00:00:53,920 --> 00:00:57,120 how you make them feel whilst you're doing all of that stuff I 18 00:00:57,120 --> 00:01:00,720 think is the trick. We speak with Andy about the 19 00:01:00,720 --> 00:01:03,840 importance of developing trust and legitimacy, both for prison 20 00:01:03,840 --> 00:01:06,640 and probation officers, and the value of reflective practise. 21 00:01:08,040 --> 00:01:12,480 In just changing that word from engaging to connecting, it just 22 00:01:12,480 --> 00:01:16,280 means that you recognise that you also play a role in how you 23 00:01:16,280 --> 00:01:19,920 knocked on the door, your facial expressions, your tone of voice. 24 00:01:21,360 --> 00:01:24,040 It's a powerful conversation that brings together insight 25 00:01:24,040 --> 00:01:27,000 from lived experience and frontline practise, highlighting 26 00:01:27,000 --> 00:01:30,280 what it means to be a good practitioner in often complex 27 00:01:30,280 --> 00:01:33,800 and challenging environments. Let's get into our conversation 28 00:01:33,800 --> 00:01:47,120 with Andy. So we're really excited today to 29 00:01:47,120 --> 00:01:50,320 have Andy Brierley with us. Welcome, Andy. 30 00:01:50,320 --> 00:01:53,720 So just to begin, it'd be really great if you could tell us a bit 31 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:56,840 about your background and what led you to your current role in 32 00:01:56,840 --> 00:01:57,920 academia. OK. 33 00:01:57,920 --> 00:02:01,760 So first of all, obviously, thanks for having me come on and 34 00:02:01,760 --> 00:02:03,440 speak on your podcast. It's a privilege. 35 00:02:03,960 --> 00:02:06,800 So I'm going to jump around a little bit because I suppose 36 00:02:06,800 --> 00:02:09,759 it'll make sense as as we go through. 37 00:02:09,759 --> 00:02:14,240 But I actually started working in youth justice in Leeds in 38 00:02:14,240 --> 00:02:18,000 2007 and they were called yachts back then. 39 00:02:18,000 --> 00:02:20,280 So they were called Youth Offending Team, I forget that 40 00:02:20,280 --> 00:02:24,600 sometimes and call them Youth Justice Services during my time 41 00:02:24,600 --> 00:02:29,120 in and around youth justice. So we say to from 2007 to 2021, 42 00:02:29,160 --> 00:02:32,200 I included various rules. So part of that I did case 43 00:02:32,200 --> 00:02:34,160 management. So it was risk managing young 44 00:02:34,160 --> 00:02:38,960 people in the community or well, they were either on supervision 45 00:02:38,960 --> 00:02:42,080 orders, we originally called them and youth rehabilitation 46 00:02:42,080 --> 00:02:44,920 orders later and while they were serving like detention training 47 00:02:44,920 --> 00:02:46,320 orders. So when they were on release 48 00:02:46,320 --> 00:02:48,600 from custody. And then towards the latter 49 00:02:48,600 --> 00:02:52,920 years, I did different roles, employed for a, in a strategic 50 00:02:52,920 --> 00:02:54,080 role. I actually got the title. 51 00:02:54,240 --> 00:02:58,440 It was called Child Looked After and Care Leaver Specialist. 52 00:02:58,520 --> 00:03:02,200 Yeah, I, I often say you don't want a title like that in the 53 00:03:02,200 --> 00:03:04,640 criminal justice system because all it means is that everybody 54 00:03:04,640 --> 00:03:08,680 comes to you for answers. And I'm not social work trained. 55 00:03:08,680 --> 00:03:11,480 And probably, you know, I'll explain why I got that role in a 56 00:03:11,480 --> 00:03:13,440 minute. And I also have worked and 57 00:03:13,440 --> 00:03:17,160 continue to work in whether it be young offenders institution 58 00:03:17,440 --> 00:03:21,360 and during COVID it was also seconded to work in Adelbeck 59 00:03:21,360 --> 00:03:24,600 Secure Children's Home. So I've had a varied youth 60 00:03:24,600 --> 00:03:26,680 justice career in different roles. 61 00:03:27,360 --> 00:03:31,920 However, two years prior to knocking on the door at leisure 62 00:03:31,920 --> 00:03:34,360 of justice service, I was actually released from Lindon 63 00:03:34,360 --> 00:03:37,680 Prison and that was a fourth prison sentence. 64 00:03:37,680 --> 00:03:40,520 So I started coming into contact with the criminal justice system 65 00:03:40,520 --> 00:03:44,000 when I was about 15 and I won't go into too much detail, but 66 00:03:44,000 --> 00:03:48,600 that was really, I had similar experiences to lots of young 67 00:03:48,600 --> 00:03:50,840 people that come into contact with the youth justice system. 68 00:03:50,840 --> 00:03:54,760 So care and being removed and placed in care system, myself 69 00:03:54,760 --> 00:03:57,960 also being excluded from school and being quite dysfunctional 70 00:03:57,960 --> 00:03:59,600 and I ended up addicted to heroin. 71 00:03:59,600 --> 00:04:03,520 So I spent about four years in and out of prison between the 72 00:04:03,520 --> 00:04:08,320 ages of 17 and 23. And that's pretty much shaped 73 00:04:08,320 --> 00:04:12,920 most of them, what I've done in youth justice, my perspective, 74 00:04:12,920 --> 00:04:15,480 etcetera, and how I worked with those young people up with. 75 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:20,839 And then in 2021, off the back of writing some stuff because I 76 00:04:20,880 --> 00:04:24,160 had this unique entry into youth justice, I thought I'm going to 77 00:04:24,160 --> 00:04:26,960 start writing about some of my perspectives on the criminal 78 00:04:26,960 --> 00:04:30,280 justice system, on how the criminal justice system works 79 00:04:30,280 --> 00:04:32,800 with young people in particular. And someone actually came to me 80 00:04:32,800 --> 00:04:36,200 in 2021 and said that they just won the contracts for the 81 00:04:36,200 --> 00:04:40,120 unlocked masters at Leeds Trinity University and that used 82 00:04:40,120 --> 00:04:41,600 to go and do the odd lecture there. 83 00:04:41,600 --> 00:04:43,080 And she said, have you ever thought about coming and 84 00:04:43,080 --> 00:04:45,640 teaching, Andy? I can remember it being quite 85 00:04:45,640 --> 00:04:49,600 jarring teaching and then even more so, It was like teaching 86 00:04:49,600 --> 00:04:52,960 prison officers, those people that used to put me behind the 87 00:04:52,960 --> 00:04:54,640 door. So it was quite an interesting 88 00:04:54,640 --> 00:04:56,960 question. But I'd spent 15 years in youth 89 00:04:56,960 --> 00:04:59,840 justice practise and was ready for a new challenge. 90 00:05:00,600 --> 00:05:04,440 And so I agreed, applied for the job, was successful, and I 91 00:05:04,440 --> 00:05:08,160 suppose you could call that a complete 360 really, from being 92 00:05:08,160 --> 00:05:10,480 locked behind my door to teaching prison officers how to 93 00:05:10,480 --> 00:05:12,280 work with those that they lock behind their doors. 94 00:05:12,920 --> 00:05:15,760 So it sounds like you're quite surprised by someone suggesting 95 00:05:15,760 --> 00:05:19,600 that to you to walk into that role as a teacher and training 96 00:05:19,600 --> 00:05:23,440 prison officers. Yeah, I think it's because I 97 00:05:23,440 --> 00:05:25,880 wrote two books while they were in practise. 1 was a memoir and 98 00:05:25,880 --> 00:05:28,400 one was a a textbook. So I wouldn't say I wasn't 99 00:05:28,400 --> 00:05:30,720 academic. I am quite a naturally kind of 100 00:05:30,720 --> 00:05:34,560 dynamic and engaging person. And so I think part of the part 101 00:05:34,560 --> 00:05:38,280 of the idea of having me on the team was probably partly because 102 00:05:38,280 --> 00:05:40,800 I had a specific background. But I think because of the work 103 00:05:40,800 --> 00:05:43,560 that I've done with young people and the passion that I've got, I 104 00:05:43,560 --> 00:05:46,320 think they wanted that passion in the classroom as a kind of 105 00:05:46,320 --> 00:05:49,120 diverse person who made-up the team. 106 00:05:49,120 --> 00:05:52,080 But I felt it was a real privilege, if I'm being honest, 107 00:05:52,080 --> 00:05:55,520 to be able to make that positive contribution to prison practise. 108 00:05:55,920 --> 00:05:58,640 Thank you. So we'll put it as a link note 109 00:05:58,640 --> 00:06:02,040 in our episode show notes. But I'd really recommend anyone 110 00:06:02,040 --> 00:06:05,240 listening to read your book, the memoir you talked about, about 111 00:06:05,240 --> 00:06:07,240 your story, because it's great that you've managed to share 112 00:06:07,240 --> 00:06:07,600 that. Yeah. 113 00:06:07,600 --> 00:06:10,280 What we wanted to talk to you a bit about today was you were 114 00:06:10,280 --> 00:06:13,240 recently editor of a book called The Good Prison Officer. 115 00:06:13,520 --> 00:06:16,160 So that's what made you think this would be an important book 116 00:06:16,160 --> 00:06:18,320 to write? Well, I suppose it's a nice 117 00:06:18,320 --> 00:06:22,120 segue in from the from, from a previous explanation into going 118 00:06:22,120 --> 00:06:25,120 and teaching on the unlocked masters. 119 00:06:25,200 --> 00:06:28,600 It's not that I was affair with the literature on prisons per 120 00:06:28,600 --> 00:06:30,680 SE. I was I was more kind of 121 00:06:31,320 --> 00:06:34,560 familiar with the youth justice literature, you know, child 122 00:06:34,560 --> 00:06:38,840 first policies, etcetera. But when I got to reading some 123 00:06:38,840 --> 00:06:43,680 of the classical prison research from Sykes Goffman, Alison 124 00:06:43,680 --> 00:06:48,200 Leibling, Ben Crewe, I felt that there was something missing. 125 00:06:48,440 --> 00:06:52,240 And I know I'm doing my PhD now, but a lot of it obviously is an 126 00:06:52,240 --> 00:06:56,160 interpretation of what you're seeing, which is fine. 127 00:06:56,160 --> 00:06:58,240 That's how it has to be, the research in prison. 128 00:06:58,240 --> 00:07:00,440 Actually, I think some of the scholars like Leibling and Crewe 129 00:07:00,440 --> 00:07:02,760 are really, really good. But when I was reading the kind 130 00:07:02,760 --> 00:07:06,280 of whether it was about the prison culture or whether it was 131 00:07:06,280 --> 00:07:09,240 about the prison officer practise, I just felt that how 132 00:07:09,240 --> 00:07:13,040 that is received as a prisoner was just missing in the 133 00:07:13,040 --> 00:07:15,800 literature. Now I knew that there was a 134 00:07:16,680 --> 00:07:19,480 group of researchers called Convict Criminologist that 135 00:07:19,480 --> 00:07:24,880 started in the US in 2000, but they'd not really taken on the 136 00:07:24,880 --> 00:07:27,400 receiving prison officer practise per SE. 137 00:07:27,960 --> 00:07:30,680 The the other bit that is probably worth mentioning is 138 00:07:30,680 --> 00:07:32,320 because I like to challenge myself. 139 00:07:32,320 --> 00:07:34,480 Probably didn't think this throughout the time, but a lot 140 00:07:34,480 --> 00:07:37,720 of the people who come into convict criminology were people 141 00:07:37,720 --> 00:07:41,880 that often have human, cultural or social capital prior to going 142 00:07:41,880 --> 00:07:43,600 to prison. Some of them actually have 143 00:07:43,840 --> 00:07:47,600 degrees and masters before going to prison and then come out and 144 00:07:47,600 --> 00:07:50,720 continue on that trajectory. Again, absolutely fine. 145 00:07:50,720 --> 00:07:54,280 But with my background and the people that I moved with in 146 00:07:54,280 --> 00:07:56,240 prison, it wasn't that group of people. 147 00:07:56,640 --> 00:08:00,120 So to get that raw authenticity, I set myself a couple of 148 00:08:00,120 --> 00:08:01,720 criteria. So the first one was that 149 00:08:01,720 --> 00:08:04,760 obviously they had to have been to prison, but they had to have 150 00:08:04,760 --> 00:08:07,040 been in some kind of professional role because I 151 00:08:07,040 --> 00:08:09,880 wanted them to be able to have that kind of broader perspective 152 00:08:09,880 --> 00:08:12,720 of the criminal justice system. And then on top of that, I 153 00:08:12,720 --> 00:08:16,680 wanted them to have been in experienced youth incarceration, 154 00:08:16,680 --> 00:08:19,400 the care experience, substance misuse and recovery. 155 00:08:20,000 --> 00:08:23,040 So then I started to think, well how many of these people kind of 156 00:08:23,080 --> 00:08:25,160 exist to contribute to this book? 157 00:08:25,160 --> 00:08:27,840 But low and behold, I actually found them probably be something 158 00:08:27,840 --> 00:08:30,000 to do with the circles that was keeping myself. 159 00:08:30,600 --> 00:08:34,679 I approached 6 people and they all agreed to write a chapter 160 00:08:35,400 --> 00:08:38,679 but they had to focus on both good and bad Prison Officer 161 00:08:38,679 --> 00:08:42,120 practise the creative edited handbook that can help prison 162 00:08:42,120 --> 00:08:44,960 officers really understand the impact of their work. 163 00:08:45,160 --> 00:08:47,760 Because I think in prisons and the morale gets down because all 164 00:08:47,760 --> 00:08:51,120 they see is their failures. They they don't really see their 165 00:08:51,120 --> 00:08:52,840 successes. So it would the book was 166 00:08:52,840 --> 00:08:56,360 symbolic as much as anything else because the end of it was 167 00:08:56,360 --> 00:08:59,160 that these individuals wanted prison officers to be trapped, 168 00:08:59,160 --> 00:09:01,880 well paid, well trained and if we do that, they're more likely 169 00:09:01,880 --> 00:09:03,400 to have a better outcome for prisoners. 170 00:09:03,480 --> 00:09:06,680 I wasn't expecting that when I set off in the journey, but lo 171 00:09:06,680 --> 00:09:07,840 and behold, that was the outcome. 172 00:09:08,680 --> 00:09:11,680 And it was really interesting the way that you you were able 173 00:09:11,680 --> 00:09:15,000 to identify the positives and then pick out ways that they 174 00:09:15,000 --> 00:09:18,400 could develop their role and really identify key themes 175 00:09:18,400 --> 00:09:21,720 there. So many of our listeners are P 176 00:09:21,720 --> 00:09:24,600 quip training probation officers here at the start of their 177 00:09:24,600 --> 00:09:27,240 probation journey. In your chapter on the good 178 00:09:27,240 --> 00:09:29,640 prison officer, you emphasise the importance of trust. 179 00:09:30,120 --> 00:09:32,680 So we just wondered if you could tell us what you think the key 180 00:09:32,680 --> 00:09:35,240 messages are for training probation officers in relation 181 00:09:35,240 --> 00:09:38,680 to these these? Well, I think trust and 182 00:09:38,680 --> 00:09:42,200 legitimacy is pretty much everything when you're working, 183 00:09:42,200 --> 00:09:44,880 whether that's in prisons or in probation. 184 00:09:45,360 --> 00:09:50,040 Probation isn't just about intervention plans and 185 00:09:50,040 --> 00:09:55,240 objectives and ticking boxes. Without trust, sometimes we can 186 00:09:55,240 --> 00:09:58,360 become barriers because of those processes and we can be 187 00:09:58,360 --> 00:10:01,680 expecting people to do things that are outside of their 188 00:10:01,680 --> 00:10:03,880 functions in their everyday life. 189 00:10:04,080 --> 00:10:07,640 So if we're going to do that and expect that to happen, it's got 190 00:10:07,640 --> 00:10:10,400 to be advantageous for both the person that you're working with 191 00:10:10,400 --> 00:10:12,240 and yourself. And I think if you don't develop 192 00:10:12,240 --> 00:10:15,360 those trusting, compassionate relationships with the people 193 00:10:15,360 --> 00:10:18,440 that you're working with, the whole intervention can become 194 00:10:18,440 --> 00:10:21,200 problematic. For licence periods with 195 00:10:21,200 --> 00:10:24,640 probation and was supervised on community orders. 196 00:10:25,600 --> 00:10:28,440 Now I say this all the time and I don't know anybody else when 197 00:10:28,440 --> 00:10:30,560 they've come through the desistance process and they're 198 00:10:30,640 --> 00:10:34,320 they're kind of sitting on the other side of the non crime lie. 199 00:10:34,640 --> 00:10:36,480 Sit back. If you say to him what made a 200 00:10:36,480 --> 00:10:40,160 difference, I've never heard anybody say, well, it was that 201 00:10:40,160 --> 00:10:42,920 banging assessment that that probation officer did and the 202 00:10:42,920 --> 00:10:45,840 objectives that they set and how they manage my risk, it was 203 00:10:45,840 --> 00:10:49,000 incredible. So I, I know from practise that 204 00:10:49,000 --> 00:10:51,560 those things are absolutely important to keep the public 205 00:10:51,560 --> 00:10:54,720 safe and accountability and defensible decisions are 206 00:10:54,720 --> 00:10:58,880 absolutely critical to practise. But if you think about getting 207 00:10:58,880 --> 00:11:02,040 people to the other side of the desistance process, if you're 208 00:11:02,040 --> 00:11:04,680 going to be the kind of conduit that holds a hand and takes them 209 00:11:04,680 --> 00:11:07,760 from one place to the other, I just don't know how you do that 210 00:11:07,760 --> 00:11:12,280 without legitimacy and trust. So could you give us more of an 211 00:11:12,280 --> 00:11:15,160 understanding of what trust looks like from prison officers 212 00:11:15,520 --> 00:11:19,160 and examples that you've seen from probation officers to help 213 00:11:19,160 --> 00:11:22,920 those listening to identify what it could be and how they could 214 00:11:22,920 --> 00:11:25,480 build that legitimacy and trust in their practise? 215 00:11:25,480 --> 00:11:26,680 Yeah. Well, so when it comes to 216 00:11:26,680 --> 00:11:31,080 prison, so even broader from like my own experience, but 217 00:11:31,080 --> 00:11:34,840 across the themes, across the chapters of the book, most of it 218 00:11:34,840 --> 00:11:38,440 seemed to come from like the humanistic role that people 219 00:11:38,440 --> 00:11:39,920 played. It wasn't about the 220 00:11:39,960 --> 00:11:43,360 interventions, the plans, the objectives, the supervision, 221 00:11:43,360 --> 00:11:45,880 knowing what HMIP are going to come in and expect. 222 00:11:46,240 --> 00:11:48,240 We know that those things are important. 223 00:11:48,240 --> 00:11:50,480 But actually, when you read through the chapters, it was 224 00:11:50,880 --> 00:11:53,760 they're talking about football, the banter that people were 225 00:11:53,760 --> 00:11:57,680 having, the interest that you have in people's family members, 226 00:11:58,000 --> 00:12:00,640 you know, the, the fact that you'll take time to listen to 227 00:12:00,640 --> 00:12:03,040 the kind of intricate things and the details that they're 228 00:12:03,040 --> 00:12:05,920 interested in, in their lives. And that was certainly the case 229 00:12:05,920 --> 00:12:08,800 for me. I remember 1 probation officer, 230 00:12:08,800 --> 00:12:11,960 let's call her Sarah. When I used to go in to meet 231 00:12:11,960 --> 00:12:16,440 Sarah, she wasn't scared of sharing some of herself. 232 00:12:16,840 --> 00:12:21,560 Now, I never found out where she lived or what her husband's name 233 00:12:21,560 --> 00:12:26,040 or anything like that, but just in the organic humanistic 234 00:12:26,040 --> 00:12:28,480 conversations that we were having, it didn't seem 235 00:12:28,480 --> 00:12:31,360 transactional. Now I know now I'm on the 236 00:12:31,360 --> 00:12:34,320 professional side of it, that in the back of her brain she's 237 00:12:34,320 --> 00:12:37,120 doing her risk assessments and thinking about, oh, how does 238 00:12:37,120 --> 00:12:38,880 this think? What's he doing when he leaves 239 00:12:38,880 --> 00:12:40,720 here and who's he spending time with? 240 00:12:40,720 --> 00:12:43,000 Because I'm going to have to record it on the system. 241 00:12:43,000 --> 00:12:47,000 But it the trick is to get those trusting relationships because 242 00:12:47,000 --> 00:12:48,320 I've had it from prison officers. 243 00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:51,520 When I first rang up League of Justice Service, it was actually 244 00:12:51,520 --> 00:12:55,040 a prison officer's statement that said everybody loves a turn 245 00:12:55,040 --> 00:12:57,360 around story, Andy. That meant when I heard over the 246 00:12:57,360 --> 00:13:00,880 radio that League of Justice wanted volunteers, lo and 247 00:13:00,880 --> 00:13:03,160 behold, it was that prison officer's voice in my head 248 00:13:03,160 --> 00:13:05,160 saying do it, you know. So he was almost like a 249 00:13:05,160 --> 00:13:07,000 springboard for my desistance journey. 250 00:13:07,000 --> 00:13:11,320 Now, I don't put it down to him, I don't put it down to Sarah. 251 00:13:11,680 --> 00:13:13,920 It fundamentally lies with the individual. 252 00:13:14,040 --> 00:13:17,600 But having an impact on how someone feels about you is how 253 00:13:17,600 --> 00:13:19,040 to develop trust in relationships. 254 00:13:19,040 --> 00:13:22,720 I think not how clever you are or how robotic you are in doing 255 00:13:22,720 --> 00:13:25,960 the risk assessment processes, but how you make them feel 256 00:13:26,120 --> 00:13:28,600 whilst you're doing all of that stuff I think is the trick. 257 00:13:28,680 --> 00:13:30,360 Not easy, but I think that's the trick. 258 00:13:30,640 --> 00:13:34,360 Genuine belief in people, so no thoughts about doing a good 259 00:13:34,360 --> 00:13:37,960 probation officer book at all? I have had a conversation with 260 00:13:38,080 --> 00:13:41,680 some scholars about the potential of a good probation 261 00:13:41,680 --> 00:13:44,320 officer book. Well it almost like lend it. 262 00:13:44,640 --> 00:13:46,440 It's a series to some degree, isn't it? 263 00:13:46,680 --> 00:13:49,200 So watch this space. I believe in your ability to do 264 00:13:49,240 --> 00:13:51,600 it there, Andy. Just to go back to your previous 265 00:13:51,600 --> 00:13:55,160 point, Andy, about I'm trying to develop like genuine interest or 266 00:13:55,360 --> 00:13:56,760 building that trust with someone. 267 00:13:57,120 --> 00:14:00,880 So from when I was a probation officer, it's much, I think with 268 00:14:00,880 --> 00:14:03,200 some individuals it's easier to do than others. 269 00:14:03,200 --> 00:14:06,880 So sometimes we talk to trainees on the course and say that 270 00:14:06,880 --> 00:14:09,680 individual that you might find really difficult or maybe you 271 00:14:09,680 --> 00:14:12,760 don't even really like them. How have you got any tips for 272 00:14:13,080 --> 00:14:16,360 how do you kind of do that when it is a bit challenging? 273 00:14:16,760 --> 00:14:19,360 Well, I, I always think there's a social discipline window. 274 00:14:19,400 --> 00:14:21,600 I don't know if you've come across it, but in Leeds we used 275 00:14:21,600 --> 00:14:24,640 to, we used to say we were a restorative city and there's a 276 00:14:24,640 --> 00:14:26,840 social discipline window within restorative practise. 277 00:14:27,160 --> 00:14:29,680 So it's not restorative justice, but restorative practise. 278 00:14:29,680 --> 00:14:31,880 And there's a, there's a lovely social discipline window in 279 00:14:31,880 --> 00:14:34,440 there and it basically has four columns to it. 280 00:14:34,520 --> 00:14:37,840 So you've got with two and four and the kind of pendulum on 281 00:14:37,920 --> 00:14:40,800 either side is that you end up, we all do it. 282 00:14:40,800 --> 00:14:42,680 I've got a nine year old daughter, so I'm trying to get 283 00:14:42,680 --> 00:14:44,280 her to tie her shoelaces at the moment. 284 00:14:44,600 --> 00:14:47,720 So the ideal is the ideal doing it in the with box. 285 00:14:47,920 --> 00:14:51,560 The restorative box is that I help her, support her and get 286 00:14:51,560 --> 00:14:56,520 her to tie the shoelaces. But sometimes if I'm busy and 287 00:14:56,520 --> 00:14:59,320 we're running out the door, then I can't do things with her. 288 00:14:59,440 --> 00:15:02,720 I end up doing it for her. So, and I think that that is a 289 00:15:02,720 --> 00:15:07,160 good way of looking at it, that we all come out of that with box 290 00:15:07,160 --> 00:15:11,360 for numerous different reasons. And I would think for me, I 291 00:15:11,360 --> 00:15:13,880 would always promote the assistance, but I've worked with 292 00:15:14,680 --> 00:15:17,000 young people that have committed murder and, and I've had my case 293 00:15:17,000 --> 00:15:20,440 closed down and had to go to an inquest and had to defend the 294 00:15:20,440 --> 00:15:22,480 decisions that I made, the referrals that I made. 295 00:15:22,760 --> 00:15:26,120 So there are sometimes in an ideal situation, in this 296 00:15:26,120 --> 00:15:29,200 context, you would be working with people just to get them on 297 00:15:29,200 --> 00:15:31,240 their desistance journey. That's utopia. 298 00:15:31,880 --> 00:15:33,800 Not everybody's ready to go on the desistance journey. 299 00:15:33,800 --> 00:15:37,200 Some people are. Let's take Ben for example, 11 300 00:15:37,200 --> 00:15:42,440 young person I was working with called Ben, He was stealing cars 301 00:15:42,440 --> 00:15:43,960 and, and whizzing them around Leeds. 302 00:15:43,960 --> 00:15:46,280 And when I sat down with him in an ideal world from my lived 303 00:15:46,280 --> 00:15:49,560 experience said to him maybe you shouldn't steal cars, Maybe 304 00:15:49,560 --> 00:15:51,480 that's putting people and yourself at risk. 305 00:15:51,960 --> 00:15:55,360 And I could tell from the conversations that we, he had 306 00:15:55,360 --> 00:15:58,880 absolutely no drivers to stop stealing cars. 307 00:15:58,960 --> 00:16:02,080 And whilst he was under my supervision that that young man 308 00:16:02,080 --> 00:16:04,960 went on to cause serious harm to somebody else. 309 00:16:04,960 --> 00:16:08,440 And so for some people you have to step out of the whip box and 310 00:16:08,440 --> 00:16:12,160 you have to step into the do things to them because that is 311 00:16:12,160 --> 00:16:16,440 just a part of the court order. People in my my experience, both 312 00:16:16,440 --> 00:16:19,280 lived on practise. People go around this cycle of 313 00:16:19,280 --> 00:16:24,200 change continuously and you just got to be ready to jump in at 314 00:16:24,200 --> 00:16:26,600 the right time and know when that time is to try and get them 315 00:16:26,600 --> 00:16:28,880 back on that. It's assistance journey, but 316 00:16:29,560 --> 00:16:31,840 it's not easy when you're working in the criminal justice 317 00:16:31,840 --> 00:16:35,680 system and I think that we we can sometimes try to, 318 00:16:35,760 --> 00:16:37,720 particularly through the assistance literature. 319 00:16:37,920 --> 00:16:41,520 I feel it comes a lot from recovery and there are two very 320 00:16:41,520 --> 00:16:46,200 distinctive differences between recovery and stopping offending. 321 00:16:46,560 --> 00:16:49,440 The drivers are different, the behaviours are different. 322 00:16:49,600 --> 00:16:52,960 Usually when somebody's at point in the recovery, the addiction 323 00:16:52,960 --> 00:16:55,640 stage where they're asking for recovery, they've hit rock 324 00:16:55,640 --> 00:16:58,120 bottom. I don't think that's true for 325 00:16:58,120 --> 00:16:59,400 crime. You know, lots of people commit 326 00:16:59,400 --> 00:17:01,760 crying for different reasons. There's so many variants. 327 00:17:02,080 --> 00:17:04,520 So it's a really good question. But I would say that when you 328 00:17:04,520 --> 00:17:07,960 can get into that with bot, then do so. 329 00:17:08,240 --> 00:17:11,760 But recognise when you're not there in that with box, it 330 00:17:11,839 --> 00:17:14,240 sometimes can be because you have to be in the toolbox 331 00:17:14,480 --> 00:17:17,640 because part of our job is about protecting the public as well. 332 00:17:18,480 --> 00:17:20,119 Thank you. Yeah, that's really helpful. 333 00:17:20,760 --> 00:17:23,839 So a lot of the trainee probation officers, the P quips, 334 00:17:23,880 --> 00:17:26,160 won't really have a good understanding of what prisoners 335 00:17:26,160 --> 00:17:28,520 like. Some will, and they're probably 336 00:17:28,520 --> 00:17:30,880 going to go on placements. But for those that don't really, 337 00:17:31,000 --> 00:17:33,400 what do you think is important for them to be aware of when 338 00:17:33,400 --> 00:17:36,200 they're working with individuals who either are in prison or are 339 00:17:36,200 --> 00:17:39,200 released on licence? Yeah, OK, Good question. 340 00:17:39,640 --> 00:17:46,440 So for me, I think understanding the way humans interact or 341 00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:51,000 experience prisons is important because prison leaves a mark on, 342 00:17:51,000 --> 00:17:52,680 I think it leaves a mark on the soul. 343 00:17:53,600 --> 00:17:56,480 So sociologist and historically called it prisonisation. 344 00:17:56,480 --> 00:17:59,040 There's been a debate in the literature about whether it's an 345 00:17:59,040 --> 00:18:02,720 importation or whether it's a prisonisation, whether people 346 00:18:02,880 --> 00:18:05,840 like me, for example, you know, by the time I was incarcerated 347 00:18:06,240 --> 00:18:09,360 at 17, I've been excluded from school, being in care, being 348 00:18:09,360 --> 00:18:11,960 addicted to heroin. And now in all my time in youth 349 00:18:11,960 --> 00:18:14,240 justice, I didn't meet many people that were addicted to 350 00:18:14,240 --> 00:18:16,280 heroin. That's how dysfunctional my 351 00:18:16,320 --> 00:18:18,000 childhood. When my mum was pregnant with 352 00:18:18,000 --> 00:18:21,800 me, she was just 16 years old. She was in care and experienced 353 00:18:21,800 --> 00:18:25,480 abuse and neglect. So when I landed into prison, it 354 00:18:25,480 --> 00:18:29,520 was, I would say it compounded the experiences that had already 355 00:18:29,520 --> 00:18:33,160 happened, the adverse childhood experiences, the trauma that had 356 00:18:33,160 --> 00:18:38,720 gone prior and understanding that, or at least attempting to 357 00:18:38,720 --> 00:18:40,760 understand that because I think it's almost impossible to 358 00:18:40,760 --> 00:18:42,880 understand it if you've not experienced it. 359 00:18:42,880 --> 00:18:44,720 Like, I was there when my wife gave birth. 360 00:18:44,720 --> 00:18:47,080 Yeah. So I actually seen it, but I've 361 00:18:47,080 --> 00:18:48,960 got no idea what it's like to give birth. 362 00:18:49,720 --> 00:18:52,560 And that's OK because I could just have empathy and try to 363 00:18:52,560 --> 00:18:55,200 support my wife while I was going through that experience. 364 00:18:56,120 --> 00:18:59,720 So I've called this carceral habitus as Caputo Levine as 365 00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:01,160 well. She did some work in America. 366 00:19:01,320 --> 00:19:02,680 She's called this carceral habitus. 367 00:19:02,680 --> 00:19:04,800 So in fact, actually I've got this here because I never get 368 00:19:04,800 --> 00:19:08,440 this quote right, But habitus, according to Pierre Baudieu, 369 00:19:08,440 --> 00:19:11,440 who's a sort of French sociologist, is how we 370 00:19:11,440 --> 00:19:15,360 experience the world and the habits that we develop as we go 371 00:19:15,360 --> 00:19:18,640 through our life experience. So he says, when habitus 372 00:19:18,640 --> 00:19:22,080 encounters a social world of which it is a product, it is 373 00:19:22,080 --> 00:19:25,280 like a fish in water. It does not feel the weight of 374 00:19:25,280 --> 00:19:28,520 the water and takes the world around itself for granted. 375 00:19:28,920 --> 00:19:31,080 And we can all relate to that because when we go into an 376 00:19:31,080 --> 00:19:33,600 environment where we feel uncomfortable with a fish out of 377 00:19:33,640 --> 00:19:35,240 all, we can feel it straight away. 378 00:19:35,640 --> 00:19:38,480 And so when you come out of prison, my best way is I'm going 379 00:19:38,560 --> 00:19:40,920 to articulate from a lived experience perspective. 380 00:19:41,600 --> 00:19:44,480 And I've left prison four times. It's very, very difficult to 381 00:19:44,480 --> 00:19:47,560 shake off the residue of the carceral habitus. 382 00:19:47,680 --> 00:19:51,440 I, I'm not a tough guy really. I can look after myself, but I 383 00:19:51,440 --> 00:19:55,480 would walk into a room and project to people that I could 384 00:19:55,480 --> 00:19:58,120 fight. And that was a safety strategy. 385 00:19:58,480 --> 00:20:01,600 Now, when you do that minute after minute, hour after hour, 386 00:20:01,600 --> 00:20:05,080 day after day, month after month, it's hard to shake that 387 00:20:05,080 --> 00:20:08,280 off when you come out. So you may not be able to 388 00:20:08,280 --> 00:20:11,080 understand that as a probation officer, but that's where lived 389 00:20:11,080 --> 00:20:13,560 experience comes in and listening and compassion and 390 00:20:13,560 --> 00:20:17,080 again, that trust and legitimacy because it impacts on people 391 00:20:17,080 --> 00:20:19,640 differently. So learning about how that 392 00:20:19,640 --> 00:20:23,000 individual experienced it, the impact on their behaviour from 393 00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:26,480 their own perspective, I think is critical to the intervention. 394 00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:28,480 Yeah, that's really helpful, I think. 395 00:20:28,560 --> 00:20:30,560 And it's part of sharing interest, isn't it, about how 396 00:20:30,560 --> 00:20:32,480 did they find that? And it might take a while for 397 00:20:32,480 --> 00:20:35,360 someone to be able to feel, to be open with you and honest with 398 00:20:35,360 --> 00:20:37,440 you about how they did find it. I thank you. 399 00:20:37,760 --> 00:20:39,840 Yeah, really important reflection, so thank you for 400 00:20:39,840 --> 00:20:41,920 sharing that. So you've spoken and written 401 00:20:41,920 --> 00:20:44,240 really powerfully about your own experiences of the criminal 402 00:20:44,240 --> 00:20:47,080 justice system and you've shared some examples already in the 403 00:20:47,080 --> 00:20:49,640 podcast. So how would you say these 404 00:20:49,640 --> 00:20:52,400 experiences have shaped your views on probation practise? 405 00:20:52,400 --> 00:20:56,280 So I've gone, I've gone on a bit of a journey personally. 406 00:20:56,280 --> 00:20:58,280 I'm going to get a bit philosophical, so I'll prepare 407 00:20:58,280 --> 00:21:01,360 you for it, right. But I've just read Michelle who 408 00:21:01,360 --> 00:21:04,360 calls the birth of the prison. So it's a kind of well cited 409 00:21:04,360 --> 00:21:08,520 book and it kind of, I think I should have read it a while ago 410 00:21:08,800 --> 00:21:10,800 because I think it probably might have helped me. 411 00:21:11,760 --> 00:21:16,000 I do think that when it's youth justice or probation or social 412 00:21:16,000 --> 00:21:19,440 care or even education, whatever institutions have been created 413 00:21:19,440 --> 00:21:22,400 through kind of modernity and industrialisation and how 414 00:21:22,400 --> 00:21:27,040 society functions in the West, I think there's obviously going to 415 00:21:27,040 --> 00:21:31,960 be a limitation to what we're able to achieve in those 416 00:21:31,960 --> 00:21:34,520 institutions because they become bureaucratic. 417 00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:37,880 So the reason why I mentioned Foucault is because he talks 418 00:21:37,880 --> 00:21:42,520 about it evolving into a mechanism of discipline now, not 419 00:21:42,520 --> 00:21:47,640 necessarily a punitive sanction, but fragmenting everything off 420 00:21:47,640 --> 00:21:50,720 in a way that you can create expertise in a particular field 421 00:21:50,720 --> 00:21:53,040 over there, right. So what do you mean by that? 422 00:21:53,040 --> 00:21:55,240 So if you, if you are a blessing, you're a probation 423 00:21:55,240 --> 00:21:59,080 manager, then you'll need to know what HMIP you're going to 424 00:21:59,080 --> 00:22:01,920 come in to inspect. You'll need to know how your 425 00:22:01,920 --> 00:22:05,000 staff are keeping on top of their plans, intervention, 426 00:22:05,000 --> 00:22:08,040 supervision, etcetera. You, you know, you'll need to 427 00:22:08,040 --> 00:22:10,800 know all the purest processes and bureaucracy and the data 428 00:22:10,800 --> 00:22:12,480 that's important for your service. 429 00:22:12,480 --> 00:22:14,360 There's nothing wrong with that. That's that's inside that, 430 00:22:15,200 --> 00:22:17,360 that's knowledge. But I think what Foucault would 431 00:22:17,360 --> 00:22:19,440 say is that that's knowledge for probation. 432 00:22:19,440 --> 00:22:21,480 Then you've got knowledge over there for prisons and they've 433 00:22:21,480 --> 00:22:24,000 got knowledge over there for youth justice and knowledge over 434 00:22:24,000 --> 00:22:26,960 here for 3rd sector organisations, Prison Reform, 435 00:22:26,960 --> 00:22:29,120 etcetera, etcetera. So you might think what you want 436 00:22:29,120 --> 00:22:32,200 about Andy. Well, it's the reason why I say 437 00:22:32,200 --> 00:22:33,920 it would have been helpful for me to read that because I was 438 00:22:33,920 --> 00:22:36,160 trying to articulate that in a book I wrote while I was in 439 00:22:36,160 --> 00:22:38,240 practise called Connecting with Young People in Trouble. 440 00:22:38,280 --> 00:22:41,240 When you come through the system, you don't care about 441 00:22:41,240 --> 00:22:43,040 that. Probation officer managers 442 00:22:43,080 --> 00:22:46,800 ability to know about HMIP, none of that matters to you because 443 00:22:46,800 --> 00:22:49,720 you're on the margins of society. 444 00:22:50,080 --> 00:22:53,120 And I, I just wrote a paper from a PhD, from a literature review 445 00:22:53,120 --> 00:22:55,800 on PM mentor reading. And a lot of the, the, the 446 00:22:56,000 --> 00:22:58,600 studies that I looked, they, they all had this theme of what 447 00:22:58,600 --> 00:23:01,040 I termed as the conflict of warrants to knowledge. 448 00:23:01,040 --> 00:23:04,200 And I think it's because when you come through, if you're me, 449 00:23:04,200 --> 00:23:07,160 I'll come through and I learnt about APIs model and assessments 450 00:23:07,160 --> 00:23:08,960 and all, all, all the stuff. I learnt it all. 451 00:23:09,440 --> 00:23:12,120 But really I just packed it all over there when I went and 452 00:23:12,120 --> 00:23:14,080 worked with the young people because I was like, listen, I 453 00:23:14,080 --> 00:23:14,960 get it. It's shit. 454 00:23:15,040 --> 00:23:17,760 Yeah, forgive my French. Like, so none of that's really 455 00:23:17,760 --> 00:23:20,000 important for you. What's important for you is 456 00:23:20,120 --> 00:23:22,560 what's important for you, and I'm going to help you and try to 457 00:23:22,560 --> 00:23:24,920 work with you through that. So that's what I mean about get 458 00:23:24,920 --> 00:23:28,360 becoming full of philosophical. It might sound like really 459 00:23:28,360 --> 00:23:31,440 sociological what I'm saying, But if you aren't at least on 460 00:23:31,440 --> 00:23:34,440 some level considering and thinking about some of these 461 00:23:34,440 --> 00:23:38,280 institutional challenges when you're working in somewhere like 462 00:23:38,280 --> 00:23:42,200 the criminal justice system, I think you become a part of it. 463 00:23:42,280 --> 00:23:45,880 And I think PM mentors like myself, we're really good at 464 00:23:45,880 --> 00:23:48,560 getting in the margins. And I think if you can get in 465 00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:52,720 the margins of these institutional processes and the 466 00:23:52,720 --> 00:23:55,680 person, the human that you're working with, I think you can, 467 00:23:55,760 --> 00:23:58,080 you can operate better. But reading that has helped me 468 00:23:58,080 --> 00:24:00,720 realise this isn't a individual thing. 469 00:24:02,120 --> 00:24:04,880 This is broader than a single probation officer or a single 470 00:24:04,880 --> 00:24:07,880 youth justice practitioner. But we can all be human in the 471 00:24:07,880 --> 00:24:09,520 margins. I think that's what I take from 472 00:24:09,520 --> 00:24:12,400 my lived experience and my writing and probation. 473 00:24:12,800 --> 00:24:15,880 Being a human within their role, really interesting working with 474 00:24:15,880 --> 00:24:18,600 the the people that are just joining probation and their 475 00:24:18,600 --> 00:24:21,360 desires and the reasons why they're joining the service. 476 00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:24,080 And it's often because they want to work with people and they 477 00:24:24,080 --> 00:24:27,440 want to help people to change. Sometimes as they progress 478 00:24:27,440 --> 00:24:30,680 through their role, they feel frustrated by in the system that 479 00:24:30,680 --> 00:24:33,480 they're working in, how difficult it is to do that 480 00:24:33,480 --> 00:24:36,280 because of the focus on risk, because of the bureaucracy, 481 00:24:36,280 --> 00:24:38,480 because of things that are changes that are being brought 482 00:24:38,480 --> 00:24:40,760 in by government. So it is interesting because a 483 00:24:40,760 --> 00:24:44,280 lot of the motivations still really are about working 484 00:24:44,280 --> 00:24:46,160 directly with people, helping people. 485 00:24:46,760 --> 00:24:50,280 Can I give you 2 quick examples? When I worked with children in 486 00:24:50,280 --> 00:24:53,400 the youth justice system, it was most often in the last years it 487 00:24:53,400 --> 00:24:55,640 was those that have experienced social care removal. 488 00:24:55,640 --> 00:24:58,280 So they were, I looked after children or care leavers and I 489 00:24:58,280 --> 00:25:00,760 used to do what they call a participation project with them. 490 00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:02,960 I do it now in Wetherby, young offenders and I get them to 491 00:25:02,960 --> 00:25:06,520 stand up and talk to senior managers about how the systems 492 00:25:06,520 --> 00:25:08,600 can work together to get better outcomes for them. 493 00:25:08,600 --> 00:25:10,560 Really it's grounded into systems because I don't think 494 00:25:10,560 --> 00:25:12,840 they're going to change the system, but I want them to feel 495 00:25:12,840 --> 00:25:16,000 good about what they're doing right now to move away from 496 00:25:16,000 --> 00:25:20,280 their past and into this kind of new education role, so to speak. 497 00:25:20,920 --> 00:25:23,240 But they used to always say when we used to get the management in 498 00:25:23,240 --> 00:25:25,000 the same, they used to use the word system. 499 00:25:25,360 --> 00:25:27,800 And I remember one of the guys who was the head of the looked 500 00:25:27,800 --> 00:25:30,320 after services said we need to get these kids to stop saying 501 00:25:30,320 --> 00:25:33,680 system because we're supposed to be their corporate parent. 502 00:25:34,360 --> 00:25:37,120 So he was saying, if they're saying system, you don't talk 503 00:25:37,120 --> 00:25:40,280 about your parents system. So that's so the, the premise 504 00:25:40,400 --> 00:25:43,680 starting point is flawed. And I think that's why 505 00:25:43,840 --> 00:25:46,480 children's social work services is has the outcomes that it gets 506 00:25:46,480 --> 00:25:49,520 because I'm not quite sure you can parent corporately. 507 00:25:50,600 --> 00:25:51,960 And I think that's what we're trying to do. 508 00:25:52,360 --> 00:25:55,160 Another example is when I came on to unlocked, most of the guys 509 00:25:55,160 --> 00:25:57,600 that come on to unlock the criteria was that they don't got 510 00:25:57,600 --> 00:25:59,240 a 21 in their undergraduate degree. 511 00:25:59,320 --> 00:26:01,840 So they were they were going into the prison system thinking 512 00:26:01,840 --> 00:26:04,160 they were going to change live. We were talking to about the 513 00:26:04,160 --> 00:26:06,640 assistance literature. We were giving them all the 514 00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:10,160 springboard that they needed to inspire to change and to 515 00:26:10,160 --> 00:26:11,800 motivate. And then they were landed on the 516 00:26:11,800 --> 00:26:14,000 prison landings and realising that they were open and closing 517 00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:16,240 doors and getting people's apps. Yeah. 518 00:26:16,840 --> 00:26:19,920 Now, if I had the answer to to some of this stuff, I'm probably 519 00:26:19,920 --> 00:26:23,400 on more money than I am now. But I think the system, the 520 00:26:23,400 --> 00:26:27,320 terminology that's used, it can be just as damaging for people 521 00:26:27,320 --> 00:26:30,120 that work in it as people that are on the receiving end of it. 522 00:26:30,400 --> 00:26:33,080 But what the answers is, I'm not quite sure. 523 00:26:33,080 --> 00:26:37,280 But at least I think years in practise make you realise that 524 00:26:37,560 --> 00:26:40,800 the system is limited not because of you, but because of 525 00:26:40,800 --> 00:26:43,400 the kind of inner, the inequality and the bureaucracy 526 00:26:43,400 --> 00:26:45,000 that's that we're all operating within. 527 00:26:45,480 --> 00:26:47,600 Thank you for that. Some really great reflections 528 00:26:47,600 --> 00:26:51,600 and points there. So thinking about our training 529 00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:54,360 probation officers who are working with individuals who may 530 00:26:54,360 --> 00:26:56,680 have had similar life experiences to yours, you've 531 00:26:56,680 --> 00:26:58,760 shared some of your life experiences so far in the 532 00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:00,880 podcast. What do you think they should be 533 00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:03,840 mindful of and what key areas could they focus on in their 534 00:27:03,840 --> 00:27:06,080 practise? So I, I, I come at this 535 00:27:06,480 --> 00:27:09,840 completely subjectively from, from working in youth justice, 536 00:27:09,840 --> 00:27:14,280 but where I think understanding how people's let's go back to 537 00:27:14,280 --> 00:27:19,000 habitus, understand how they've become who they are is critical, 538 00:27:19,280 --> 00:27:21,640 vital. If you would have asked me when 539 00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:23,880 I was, say, 20, if I'd have had a rough upbringing and I'd 540 00:27:23,880 --> 00:27:28,760 probably said no, right, Because everybody I knew had some level 541 00:27:28,760 --> 00:27:31,040 of adversity. It's not until you get older and 542 00:27:31,040 --> 00:27:33,200 then I start moving in all these middle class spaces and I'm 543 00:27:33,200 --> 00:27:35,320 like, wow, that was bad. Yeah. 544 00:27:35,720 --> 00:27:39,320 But if I don't know that I've been shaped by these historical 545 00:27:39,520 --> 00:27:43,960 experiences and nobody's talking that through with me, how am I 546 00:27:43,960 --> 00:27:45,040 supposed to change it? Right. 547 00:27:45,880 --> 00:27:49,800 So the first point is listening and guiding the conversation, 548 00:27:49,800 --> 00:27:51,840 not telling them, oh, you've had a really upbringing? 549 00:27:51,840 --> 00:27:53,560 Because that's not going to go down well either. 550 00:27:54,080 --> 00:27:57,760 But I suppose just being that curious person that's like, oh, 551 00:27:57,760 --> 00:28:01,360 that's really interesting. I was saying if some nobody ever 552 00:28:01,360 --> 00:28:04,520 asked me in all my years in the criminal justice system, why do 553 00:28:04,520 --> 00:28:06,680 you think you gravitate towards people that are involved in 554 00:28:06,680 --> 00:28:07,920 crime? That would have been a killer 555 00:28:07,920 --> 00:28:09,800 question that would have tore my head in bits. 556 00:28:09,840 --> 00:28:13,160 Why do why do why do you feel comfortable with people that 557 00:28:13,160 --> 00:28:15,000 commit crime? Well, the obvious answer to that 558 00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:18,360 would have been everybody I've ever known has been involved in 559 00:28:18,360 --> 00:28:20,760 crime as far back as I can remember. 560 00:28:21,040 --> 00:28:22,960 OK. There wasn't a choice then 561 00:28:23,000 --> 00:28:24,920 really the. Funny thing is as well is that 562 00:28:25,120 --> 00:28:27,640 if you dig into that and you're curious about that, you 563 00:28:27,640 --> 00:28:30,440 understand just how difficult it is to move on. 564 00:28:30,680 --> 00:28:33,520 Me and Max Denny are currently writing an article putting 565 00:28:33,520 --> 00:28:36,720 status into desistance because it's I think we think it's 566 00:28:36,720 --> 00:28:39,240 missing. Colin talked about kind of 567 00:28:39,240 --> 00:28:41,920 working class boys in the he's and talked about status 568 00:28:41,920 --> 00:28:43,480 frustration. So we're using that. 569 00:28:43,920 --> 00:28:46,840 But actually it's a massive thing to ask somebody to do. 570 00:28:46,840 --> 00:28:50,360 Like even if you, even if it's Ben stealing that car, he's 571 00:28:50,360 --> 00:28:52,920 known for stealing the cars, he's known in his area for 572 00:28:52,920 --> 00:28:54,800 stealing the cars. That's where he gets his status, 573 00:28:54,800 --> 00:28:57,600 his recognition, his, his identities, all that. 574 00:28:57,600 --> 00:29:01,400 And if we're asking people to leave that behind, that's a big 575 00:29:01,400 --> 00:29:04,040 thing to do. So I think that curiosity of 576 00:29:04,040 --> 00:29:07,280 helping them unpack their own experiences if you're working 577 00:29:07,280 --> 00:29:08,520 with someone like me is critical. 578 00:29:08,840 --> 00:29:10,960 And I think you're just reminding me of someone that I 579 00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:14,720 work with who I think had been kicked out of school, didn't 580 00:29:14,720 --> 00:29:17,080 have any qualifications, who was like fairly young. 581 00:29:17,080 --> 00:29:20,320 But his main thing that he probably enjoyed and thought he 582 00:29:20,320 --> 00:29:22,040 was good at was stealing from shops. 583 00:29:22,320 --> 00:29:23,640 And he wasn't even that good at it. 584 00:29:23,640 --> 00:29:26,000 But actually that was probably his main achievement. 585 00:29:26,000 --> 00:29:28,080 Do you know what I mean? He hasn't really achieved much 586 00:29:28,080 --> 00:29:30,000 else. So it is trying to help him find 587 00:29:30,000 --> 00:29:32,240 out what else he can do that he could be really good at. 588 00:29:32,680 --> 00:29:35,360 So I remember being on Doncaster Wing and a guy, he's actually 589 00:29:35,360 --> 00:29:37,480 got a life sentence for murdering somebody eventually in 590 00:29:37,480 --> 00:29:39,400 Leeds, right? But I remember him coming in, I 591 00:29:39,400 --> 00:29:42,640 didn't know him at the time, and he came in for armed robberies. 592 00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:45,000 We must have been 20. And he come on the wing And and 593 00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:48,040 I always remember being in gaol. I was quite, I could look after 594 00:29:48,040 --> 00:29:50,320 myself, but just a bit reserved, right? 595 00:29:50,720 --> 00:29:53,680 This guy flap open as soon as he walks on the wing, right? 596 00:29:53,680 --> 00:29:56,640 And I thought, wow, yeah, this is his space. 597 00:29:57,120 --> 00:29:58,520 Now they've been caught for armed robberies. 598 00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:01,880 But there's no, you can't be, you can't be bad at crime. 599 00:30:01,880 --> 00:30:03,640 It's like, that's why I think people do it. 600 00:30:03,960 --> 00:30:06,480 You go to gaol and it's just like if you're trying to 601 00:30:06,480 --> 00:30:08,800 succeed, if I'm trying to do this PhD and I don't get through 602 00:30:08,800 --> 00:30:11,760 it and I fail, I'll be like, you know, and, and, and people say, 603 00:30:11,760 --> 00:30:13,480 I'm sorry, Andy and all this kind of stuff. 604 00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:15,920 You don't get that. If you get caught committing 605 00:30:15,920 --> 00:30:17,360 crime, you go to gaol. It don't do anything. 606 00:30:17,440 --> 00:30:19,720 You don't, you don't ruin your status at all. 607 00:30:20,400 --> 00:30:23,920 And that's why I think people get stuck in it, because, like I 608 00:30:23,920 --> 00:30:26,200 said, you're asking them to come out and come into a situation 609 00:30:26,200 --> 00:30:30,480 where actually they've got no capital, they've got no skin in 610 00:30:30,480 --> 00:30:32,520 the game. They've actually got to start 611 00:30:32,520 --> 00:30:34,960 from the bottom. And status collapse is probably 612 00:30:35,240 --> 00:30:36,760 an interesting way of framing it. 613 00:30:37,120 --> 00:30:39,000 But you can't come to those conclusions. 614 00:30:39,080 --> 00:30:41,440 But you ask open questions. Yeah. 615 00:30:41,720 --> 00:30:44,720 And you get them to come to their own conclusions about 616 00:30:44,720 --> 00:30:47,560 their experiences. And it's interesting because 617 00:30:47,560 --> 00:30:51,040 those of us on the outside of crime and prison, we might view 618 00:30:51,040 --> 00:30:53,920 it as the, the worst thing that might happen in your life, being 619 00:30:53,920 --> 00:30:57,120 caught being sent to prison. But it's, it's really important 620 00:30:57,120 --> 00:30:59,640 to hear that doesn't impact your status and it doesn't feel like 621 00:30:59,640 --> 00:31:01,320 that. So if a probation officers 622 00:31:01,320 --> 00:31:03,920 working with people that haven't had that experience themselves 623 00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:06,080 recognising and understanding that. 624 00:31:06,680 --> 00:31:09,040 Yeah, and that's why I say lived experience is one thing when 625 00:31:09,040 --> 00:31:11,120 it's important when you speak to one individual, but and 626 00:31:11,120 --> 00:31:12,320 everybody has a different experience. 627 00:31:12,320 --> 00:31:13,960 So. So I never felt any stigma 628 00:31:13,960 --> 00:31:15,520 coming out of prison, you know what I mean? 629 00:31:15,520 --> 00:31:18,920 Like in fact, in the circles that I moved in, people were 630 00:31:18,920 --> 00:31:21,280 celebrating Yo, Andy's out, you know, so your. 631 00:31:21,640 --> 00:31:23,600 Status perhaps? Yeah, 100%. 632 00:31:23,760 --> 00:31:26,040 And I think when we talk about stigma, sometimes I think we're 633 00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:28,240 looking at it kind of through a middle class lens. 634 00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:32,760 So if you've got social capital, employment, education and you. 635 00:31:32,760 --> 00:31:35,160 And also I'm thinking about somebody when I say this, when 636 00:31:35,160 --> 00:31:37,600 you drink, you drive a car, you're somebody down, you go to 637 00:31:37,600 --> 00:31:41,440 gaol, you feel when you walk out of the irony of all of this is 638 00:31:41,440 --> 00:31:43,680 that you're stigmatising other people because when you come out 639 00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,680 of prison, you feel like I'm not really like them, right? 640 00:31:47,160 --> 00:31:50,920 I, I'm only talking from my experience, never felt any 641 00:31:50,920 --> 00:31:54,440 stigma, never felt any stigma. Went back into spaces where 642 00:31:54,680 --> 00:31:56,640 actually I went into nightclubs and people were like, Oh my, 643 00:31:56,640 --> 00:31:59,640 when did you get out? And I think understanding all of 644 00:31:59,640 --> 00:32:03,120 this is the point of kind of engaging and being curious with 645 00:32:03,120 --> 00:32:04,720 people. Don't assume that they 646 00:32:04,720 --> 00:32:07,560 experienced stigma because from my experience, I certainly 647 00:32:07,560 --> 00:32:08,920 didn't. And people that I know, my 648 00:32:08,920 --> 00:32:10,520 brothers, they, they didn't either. 649 00:32:11,520 --> 00:32:13,920 Now the stigma comes when you step out of those spaces. 650 00:32:13,960 --> 00:32:16,560 If you were trying to get jobs in different roles, perhaps. 651 00:32:17,240 --> 00:32:18,560 Yeah, when I knocked on the door. 652 00:32:18,560 --> 00:32:20,880 It leads you of justice service. Do you think I didn't know about 653 00:32:20,880 --> 00:32:21,640 DBS? Check. 654 00:32:22,120 --> 00:32:24,560 I soon found out and then the stigma kicks in. 655 00:32:24,560 --> 00:32:27,520 But again, thinking about all this, why do people stay where 656 00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:29,600 they're at? Well, there are rational reasons 657 00:32:29,600 --> 00:32:32,240 why they do. Interesting, really interesting 658 00:32:32,240 --> 00:32:34,960 reflections that you're bringing out here, which leads into the 659 00:32:34,960 --> 00:32:38,000 next question we've got. Yeah, so a big part of the 660 00:32:38,240 --> 00:32:40,920 probation training programme is reflective practise. 661 00:32:40,920 --> 00:32:43,680 So getting the trainees to reflect on their practise all 662 00:32:43,680 --> 00:32:46,800 the time, thinking about what does the literature say, how is 663 00:32:46,800 --> 00:32:48,360 that helping, informing what I do it? 664 00:32:48,360 --> 00:32:50,760 How's that impacting on my work with individuals? 665 00:32:51,080 --> 00:32:54,720 But from your point of view, why would you say it's important for 666 00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:57,640 probation practitioners to be reflecting on their practise? 667 00:32:57,960 --> 00:33:00,160 Yeah, well, in my book, Connecting with Young People in 668 00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:02,320 Trouble, what I wanted to do at the end of it, after I've done 669 00:33:02,320 --> 00:33:04,960 the kind of an exploration of my experiences of being on both 670 00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:07,520 sides of the youth justice system, the guy called Dan 671 00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:10,560 Siegel, who's an expert in neuroscience. 672 00:33:11,080 --> 00:33:14,160 So he created it, but I slightly amended it for you of justice 673 00:33:14,160 --> 00:33:16,640 practise and what Dan Siegel talks about, his presence of 674 00:33:16,640 --> 00:33:20,640 human resonance and trust. So I thought actually that's how 675 00:33:20,680 --> 00:33:23,160 I operate in practise with my lived experience. 676 00:33:23,160 --> 00:33:24,640 I wanted to share that with other people. 677 00:33:24,640 --> 00:33:26,800 We should all be sharing knowledge, lived, learn and 678 00:33:26,800 --> 00:33:29,000 practise. But important for the question 679 00:33:29,000 --> 00:33:32,200 that you're asking there is I change resonant to connecting. 680 00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:36,200 So my acronym is packed presence, attunement, connection 681 00:33:36,200 --> 00:33:37,400 and trust. Why did they do that? 682 00:33:37,400 --> 00:33:41,120 Well, in the youth justice system, I would hear people say 683 00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:44,280 they're not engaging and it never sat right with me. 684 00:33:44,280 --> 00:33:45,440 I was like, what do they mean by? 685 00:33:45,440 --> 00:33:48,280 So you go in and knocking on the children's home of a 15 year old 686 00:33:48,280 --> 00:33:50,520 boy who's been abused and neglected and then he's been 687 00:33:50,520 --> 00:33:52,840 removed from his view, kidnapped from his family. 688 00:33:53,240 --> 00:33:56,160 And you've come out as a practitioner because he's got a 689 00:33:56,160 --> 00:33:58,760 referral order or a youth rehabilitation order. 690 00:33:58,760 --> 00:34:01,080 And and you're knocking on the door and saying, well, the court 691 00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:03,320 says that you've got to do XY and Z but to a traumatised, 692 00:34:03,320 --> 00:34:05,960 marginalised kid. So what I tried to do in my 693 00:34:05,960 --> 00:34:08,880 model was to say, OK, if that guy knocks on the door of the 694 00:34:09,159 --> 00:34:11,400 residential home and comes back and says to me, Andy, I've 695 00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:13,679 knocked on the door, they're not engaging. 696 00:34:13,880 --> 00:34:15,480 Maybe they need breaching, right? 697 00:34:15,719 --> 00:34:18,600 OK, that's fine. If we just slightly change the 698 00:34:18,600 --> 00:34:22,400 word to Andy, I've just knocked on the child's door, we're not 699 00:34:22,400 --> 00:34:23,760 connecting. Yeah. 700 00:34:24,320 --> 00:34:29,159 In just changing that word from engaging to connecting, it just 701 00:34:29,159 --> 00:34:32,920 means that you recognise that you also play a role in how you 702 00:34:32,920 --> 00:34:36,600 knocked on the door, your facial expressions, your tone of voice, 703 00:34:37,040 --> 00:34:39,440 because I haven't talked about children, but I think it works 704 00:34:39,440 --> 00:34:41,600 with adults. But it's, it's when you're 705 00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:44,400 talking about in terms of reflecting, it's just placing it 706 00:34:44,400 --> 00:34:48,239 in the reflection. What are they seeing when they 707 00:34:48,239 --> 00:34:50,840 see me knock on the door? Have they had previous 708 00:34:50,840 --> 00:34:53,000 experience? Is it a woman and they've had 709 00:34:53,000 --> 00:34:56,400 bad experiences with a man? So you know that does that's not 710 00:34:56,400 --> 00:34:59,560 your fault, but you're a man present in her space. 711 00:34:59,560 --> 00:35:01,920 So I think if you just think about connecting rather than 712 00:35:01,920 --> 00:35:04,560 engagement, I think that really helps with the reflection 713 00:35:04,560 --> 00:35:06,520 process when you're working with marginalised people. 714 00:35:06,520 --> 00:35:08,960 I think that's really helpful because you're right, a lot of 715 00:35:08,960 --> 00:35:12,920 people are difficult to engage, but we also need to look at, 716 00:35:13,160 --> 00:35:16,880 well, was I really stressed and busy, so actually how did I come 717 00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:18,760 across? By the way, the answer is 718 00:35:18,760 --> 00:35:20,760 probably yes to that question. Yeah, yeah. 719 00:35:21,120 --> 00:35:23,800 Exactly. So it is and I reflect back now 720 00:35:23,800 --> 00:35:28,440 and think, OK, like one example that I have that someone that 721 00:35:28,440 --> 00:35:30,760 got transferred to my office and I thought, well, I'll go down 722 00:35:30,760 --> 00:35:33,880 and be really friendly and just say hi, do you like just want to 723 00:35:33,880 --> 00:35:36,080 see me? And he got really annoyed 724 00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:38,680 because he didn't know he was going to see me and he, I think 725 00:35:38,680 --> 00:35:41,000 he thought, Oh no, she might take me in like 1/2 hour 726 00:35:41,000 --> 00:35:44,000 appointment. So I, so I didn't quite realise 727 00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:46,360 at the time, I just thought he's not wanting to talk to me. 728 00:35:46,800 --> 00:35:50,080 But actually from his point of view, he probably was, I'm being 729 00:35:50,080 --> 00:35:52,080 forced to come here, but I didn't, I was going to be told 730 00:35:52,080 --> 00:35:53,200 to see you. But yeah, you're right. 731 00:35:53,200 --> 00:35:56,600 If we reflect back, because there might be lots of reasons 732 00:35:56,600 --> 00:35:58,720 he didn't want to see me in the 1st place anyway. 733 00:35:59,240 --> 00:36:02,760 But it's helpful to think how do I impact on it rather than 734 00:36:02,760 --> 00:36:05,360 they're just not engaging. Relationships are reciprocal in 735 00:36:05,400 --> 00:36:08,400 some way, aren't they? We all play a role and it's not 736 00:36:08,400 --> 00:36:10,280 easy to recognise that in the criminal justice system. 737 00:36:10,280 --> 00:36:12,360 I mean, look, I've married 10 years. 738 00:36:12,360 --> 00:36:14,520 My wife would tell you I don't always recognise it in our 739 00:36:14,720 --> 00:36:16,760 marriage. So it's not easy, especially 740 00:36:16,760 --> 00:36:18,960 when you're working with people that can sometimes present with 741 00:36:18,960 --> 00:36:21,800 really difficult behaviours. But sometimes because we're 742 00:36:21,800 --> 00:36:25,680 busy, I think we can become lazy and we can use words like these 743 00:36:25,680 --> 00:36:27,840 people are complex, they're not engaging. 744 00:36:27,840 --> 00:36:31,320 And it's not because we've got negative intentions, it's just 745 00:36:31,320 --> 00:36:35,160 because, again, going back to the system bit, we're all busy. 746 00:36:35,240 --> 00:36:37,160 So being reflective in that space can be difficult, but 747 00:36:37,160 --> 00:36:39,720 connecting is a better way than an engagement I would say. 748 00:36:40,480 --> 00:36:42,920 Thank you. So there seems to be kind of an 749 00:36:42,920 --> 00:36:46,240 increasing recognition of the value of involving people with 750 00:36:46,240 --> 00:36:48,920 lived experience in shaping probation practise or the 751 00:36:48,920 --> 00:36:51,760 criminal justice system. And you've written this book 752 00:36:51,760 --> 00:36:54,760 about the good prison officer. But how do you think lived 753 00:36:54,760 --> 00:36:57,320 experience or those with lived experience can help shape the 754 00:36:57,320 --> 00:37:00,680 probation service to improve it? Big question this. 755 00:37:00,960 --> 00:37:03,960 I've just, I've just written something with my friend and 756 00:37:03,960 --> 00:37:06,720 colleague Paula Harriet that's trying to get to the complexity 757 00:37:06,720 --> 00:37:10,920 of some of this stuff. So for me, lived experience 758 00:37:10,920 --> 00:37:14,760 isn't very well conceptual. So if we say is lived 759 00:37:14,760 --> 00:37:17,960 experience, as we've already outlined, is it critical to 760 00:37:17,960 --> 00:37:19,720 working with people in the criminal justice system? 761 00:37:20,240 --> 00:37:25,400 Absolutely, it has to be because their own experience and having 762 00:37:25,640 --> 00:37:28,160 an understanding of where they've come from, where they 763 00:37:28,160 --> 00:37:31,800 are and where they're trying to go is essential that you like. 764 00:37:31,800 --> 00:37:35,000 Without it, you can't really have a desired outcome. 765 00:37:35,040 --> 00:37:36,680 So that's the first part of the question. 766 00:37:36,800 --> 00:37:40,400 The second part of the question is I don't know whether there's 767 00:37:40,400 --> 00:37:43,560 any cheques and balances or gatekeepers on lived experience 768 00:37:43,560 --> 00:37:45,920 knowledge. So I think because of the things 769 00:37:45,920 --> 00:37:48,640 that we were talking about in terms of systems and Focal's 770 00:37:48,640 --> 00:37:51,400 ideas of discipline, we know that we're not really having the 771 00:37:51,400 --> 00:37:53,680 desired effect on a kind of systemic level. 772 00:37:54,240 --> 00:37:57,080 So we're pondering out what do we do about that and how have 773 00:37:57,080 --> 00:38:00,200 these people been marginalised and excluded and and become 774 00:38:00,200 --> 00:38:02,000 voiceless and trying to elevate them. 775 00:38:02,160 --> 00:38:05,680 Again, humble things to do. I'm not quite sure that equates 776 00:38:05,680 --> 00:38:11,280 to somebody having been in prison understanding the answers 777 00:38:11,280 --> 00:38:13,680 for how to run a prison. It's interesting because in my 778 00:38:13,680 --> 00:38:17,520 PhD research, I'm going through the data analysis as we speak, 779 00:38:18,040 --> 00:38:20,440 and a lot of the participants are saying they want to be 780 00:38:20,440 --> 00:38:22,560 recruited because of their skills, not because of their 781 00:38:22,560 --> 00:38:26,080 background. And we can fall into a trap of 782 00:38:26,080 --> 00:38:28,760 recruiting peer mentors. So all the people that I'm 783 00:38:28,760 --> 00:38:30,560 interviewing are professionals. So that. 784 00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:33,760 So again, the terminology of peer mentors is interesting for 785 00:38:33,760 --> 00:38:36,360 them because you're almost saying that they haven't gone 786 00:38:36,360 --> 00:38:38,280 through a certain process when they have. 787 00:38:38,720 --> 00:38:41,240 So I might be challenging that a little bit in my PhD. 788 00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:44,840 It's probably more appropriate for prisoners, PMS or in other 789 00:38:44,840 --> 00:38:47,120 prisoners, if that makes sense. Probably the right, the 790 00:38:47,120 --> 00:38:50,440 definition is in the same age or social circumstance as the 791 00:38:50,440 --> 00:38:52,360 meant. So, So we could be getting 792 00:38:52,360 --> 00:38:55,360 people to come into conferences and talk about their experiences 793 00:38:55,360 --> 00:38:59,800 again, trapping them in traumatic pasts rather than and 794 00:38:59,800 --> 00:39:02,360 allowing them to become the person that they they want to 795 00:39:02,360 --> 00:39:04,400 be. The other bit that I think needs 796 00:39:04,480 --> 00:39:07,840 finding out is the integration of the digital revolution that 797 00:39:07,840 --> 00:39:11,040 we're seeing and people like being now on social media and 798 00:39:11,040 --> 00:39:13,960 challenging the system because they've got lived experience 799 00:39:14,000 --> 00:39:16,320 through the kind of ideas of reform. 800 00:39:16,680 --> 00:39:18,320 There's absolute benefits to that. 801 00:39:18,520 --> 00:39:20,560 But I think we need a proper conversation about what some of 802 00:39:20,560 --> 00:39:23,760 the challenges are as well, because there are some, I've 803 00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:27,120 come off social media now partly because of some of this, but 804 00:39:27,120 --> 00:39:29,400 you're seeing people talk about their school exclusion, their 805 00:39:29,400 --> 00:39:32,320 care experience, and they're putting it regularly, almost 806 00:39:32,320 --> 00:39:35,640 daily on social media. Well, we'd need to have a 807 00:39:35,640 --> 00:39:37,760 conversation about not that we can stop it because social 808 00:39:37,760 --> 00:39:40,520 media's it's own space. So I think if we think about it 809 00:39:40,520 --> 00:39:43,440 two different levels, lived experience has everything to do 810 00:39:43,440 --> 00:39:45,800 with practise. If you for your P quip learners, 811 00:39:46,120 --> 00:39:48,240 lived experience is critical and essential. 812 00:39:48,520 --> 00:39:53,800 But when we go into more reformist spaces, I think it's, 813 00:39:53,880 --> 00:39:57,440 again, it's got a role to play, but I'm just not quite sure 814 00:39:57,440 --> 00:39:59,920 we're heading in a direction that's keeping everybody safe. 815 00:39:59,920 --> 00:40:02,040 So I do have some reservations about that. 816 00:40:02,120 --> 00:40:03,400 Does that make sense? Yeah. 817 00:40:03,680 --> 00:40:05,000 Yeah. And it sounds like you're 818 00:40:05,000 --> 00:40:07,960 working through your ideas around this as you're developing 819 00:40:07,960 --> 00:40:10,080 your PhD as well. Absolutely, yeah. 820 00:40:10,080 --> 00:40:13,000 So I don't have any answers. Interesting to see where you end 821 00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:14,560 up. So thank you for that. 822 00:40:14,800 --> 00:40:18,200 So now Andy, we're going to give you a special power, we're going 823 00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:21,680 to give you a magic wand where you have the power to implement 824 00:40:21,680 --> 00:40:24,400 one change to improve probation practise. 825 00:40:24,720 --> 00:40:27,400 And we're intrigued what that power would be. 826 00:40:27,400 --> 00:40:28,240 What? What would you do? 827 00:40:28,560 --> 00:40:30,520 Well, it's an interesting question if you could change one 828 00:40:30,520 --> 00:40:33,800 thing, like 1 mechanism of it, I think, and I'm not a probation 829 00:40:33,800 --> 00:40:38,320 expert, but if we go back to before 1990s and what probation 830 00:40:38,440 --> 00:40:41,920 was set up to do and how it functioned, my understanding is 831 00:40:41,920 --> 00:40:44,200 it was embedded in kind of social work principles and 832 00:40:44,200 --> 00:40:46,480 that's how people were trained. And then they had the 833 00:40:46,480 --> 00:40:49,720 introduction of the 1991 Criminal Justice Act, which 834 00:40:49,760 --> 00:40:52,080 reframed it as punishment in the community. 835 00:40:52,080 --> 00:40:54,680 And you're even seeing that go a little bit further, saying that 836 00:40:54,720 --> 00:40:56,200 it's going to be prisons in the community. 837 00:40:56,320 --> 00:40:59,360 So that's the wrong direction. So I'm going to push back and 838 00:40:59,360 --> 00:41:03,000 say let's go a different way. My perfect solution if I was in 839 00:41:03,000 --> 00:41:06,360 utopia would be that if we go back to Habitus, if you want to 840 00:41:06,360 --> 00:41:08,600 understand where people come from, you've got to be where 841 00:41:08,600 --> 00:41:10,760 they are, you've got to be in their communities. 842 00:41:11,200 --> 00:41:14,560 So I would come away from all the risk needs, responsivity, 843 00:41:14,560 --> 00:41:17,360 the what works, the risk assessment processes. 844 00:41:18,000 --> 00:41:19,600 We've got AI now. So when I worked out youth 845 00:41:19,600 --> 00:41:22,560 justice and I come out of a home visit, I should have been able 846 00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:26,160 to say baby sound or there's risk that needs to be worked 847 00:41:26,160 --> 00:41:28,760 upon later on and then bounce off to another house and so not 848 00:41:28,760 --> 00:41:31,160 back to the office. So if I could, I know it would 849 00:41:31,160 --> 00:41:33,280 be a huge change. And I'm not saying I'm wiser 850 00:41:33,280 --> 00:41:36,680 than Andrews and Bonter, but what I would say is that most 851 00:41:36,680 --> 00:41:39,800 people come into probation because they want to help 852 00:41:39,800 --> 00:41:41,880 people. And I think actually they find 853 00:41:41,880 --> 00:41:44,640 out very quickly that they're basically administrative 854 00:41:44,640 --> 00:41:46,880 workers. So I would strip all of that 855 00:41:46,880 --> 00:41:49,880 back, go back to pre 1990 kind of principles and I'm not 856 00:41:49,880 --> 00:41:54,520 looking back at a nostalgic kind of utopian sense, but I would 857 00:41:54,520 --> 00:41:58,160 say free operation officers up to be in the communities to 858 00:41:58,160 --> 00:42:00,560 understand the environment that people are coming from. 859 00:42:00,560 --> 00:42:03,240 And I think they'd be far better at being able to help. 860 00:42:03,320 --> 00:42:06,360 And by the way, I think probation officers would have a 861 00:42:06,360 --> 00:42:08,240 far better morale if that's what they were doing. 862 00:42:08,680 --> 00:42:10,000 Brilliant. I'm all for that one. 863 00:42:10,000 --> 00:42:12,720 So turn back the clock. Yeah, a bit radical, but there 864 00:42:12,720 --> 00:42:14,360 you go. Is that magic wand for good? 865 00:42:14,360 --> 00:42:17,480 I like it. OK, so Andy, you've referred to 866 00:42:17,480 --> 00:42:21,000 lots of literature in this podcast so far, but if you could 867 00:42:21,000 --> 00:42:24,240 recommend a couple of books or articles for our listeners who 868 00:42:24,240 --> 00:42:26,800 want to explore this topic further, what would you 869 00:42:26,800 --> 00:42:28,280 recommend? We'll put them in the show notes 870 00:42:28,280 --> 00:42:31,880 and they can access them. Well, I'd have to jump on to 871 00:42:32,000 --> 00:42:35,080 full cause discipline and punish in the birth of the prison. 872 00:42:35,160 --> 00:42:36,800 I wish I'd have read that earlier actually. 873 00:42:36,800 --> 00:42:40,320 I think it helped me understand some of my frustrations and this 874 00:42:40,320 --> 00:42:42,560 might be a surprise. Diana Johns did a book called 875 00:42:42,560 --> 00:42:45,080 Being and Becoming an ex Prisoner and it was in 876 00:42:45,080 --> 00:42:47,000 Australia. But I, I think it's the closest 877 00:42:47,000 --> 00:42:50,800 thing that I've ever read where someone really got to grips with 878 00:42:50,800 --> 00:42:54,200 the post prison experience and how to supervise and the 879 00:42:54,200 --> 00:42:56,520 challenges there. So I would, I would recommend 880 00:42:56,520 --> 00:42:58,680 that. And and finally, one of the best 881 00:42:58,680 --> 00:43:00,000 books I've read. Nothing. 882 00:43:00,000 --> 00:43:02,160 It's more around kind of childhood trauma is Bessel than 883 00:43:02,160 --> 00:43:03,920 the Cokes. The body keeps the score. 884 00:43:04,600 --> 00:43:08,080 It really does help. He uses case studies from his 885 00:43:08,080 --> 00:43:11,200 practise around PTSD. That certainly helps me in youth 886 00:43:11,200 --> 00:43:13,240 justice. But I do think we know from the 887 00:43:13,280 --> 00:43:16,840 AC study that this stuff has a kind of live course effect. 888 00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:19,440 So I do think it will be helpful for for probation officers as 889 00:43:19,440 --> 00:43:22,080 well. A good range of recommendations 890 00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:23,360 there. We will also include your 891 00:43:23,360 --> 00:43:26,040 publications in our show so people can track those down 892 00:43:26,040 --> 00:43:27,440 after they've listened to this episode. 893 00:43:27,640 --> 00:43:29,560 Thank you very much for that, Andy. 894 00:43:29,840 --> 00:43:30,720 Yeah. Thank you. 895 00:43:30,840 --> 00:43:32,080 It's been great having you on the show. 896 00:43:32,080 --> 00:43:34,680 But before you go, is there anything that you wanted to say 897 00:43:34,680 --> 00:43:36,080 that you don't really have the chance to? 898 00:43:36,840 --> 00:43:39,400 I think I would summarise going back to the restorative window 899 00:43:39,520 --> 00:43:44,560 of four with and two and try to use desistance as a kind of 900 00:43:44,560 --> 00:43:47,520 ideology rather than rehabilitation, because the way 901 00:43:47,520 --> 00:43:49,880 I see rehabilitation and desistance is kind of similar 902 00:43:49,880 --> 00:43:52,040 things. So rehabilitation, you know, is 903 00:43:52,040 --> 00:43:54,840 an idea of doing things to people, whereas desistance is 904 00:43:54,840 --> 00:43:57,120 doing things alongside people and putting them at the centre 905 00:43:57,120 --> 00:43:59,320 of the intervention. So I always think that's the 906 00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:02,280 best way I think about practise when I'm working with people. 907 00:44:02,280 --> 00:44:03,560 Thank you. That's really helpful. 908 00:44:03,560 --> 00:44:06,320 Because that's what we get the students to think about and 909 00:44:06,320 --> 00:44:09,120 explore actually on the course about our rehabilitation 910 00:44:09,120 --> 00:44:11,360 desistance the same. Yeah. 911 00:44:12,520 --> 00:44:13,920 Lovely. Thank you so much. 912 00:44:14,600 --> 00:44:16,400 Thank you really. Useful final thought there. 913 00:44:16,400 --> 00:44:19,040 So thank you, Andy. You're very welcome and thank 914 00:44:19,040 --> 00:44:23,280 you for having me on. Thanks for listening to 915 00:44:23,280 --> 00:44:26,520 Probation Perspectives Insights into community justice. 916 00:44:26,840 --> 00:44:29,840 We hope our conversation with Andy Briley offered new ways of 917 00:44:29,840 --> 00:44:33,000 thinking about professional identity, values and the 918 00:44:33,000 --> 00:44:35,440 importance of relational practise throughout the criminal 919 00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:38,160 justice system. From what makes a good prison 920 00:44:38,160 --> 00:44:41,400 officer to exploring how human relationships can foster change, 921 00:44:41,680 --> 00:44:44,360 we trust this episode offered insight for both reflection and 922 00:44:44,360 --> 00:44:46,760 practise. If you found this episode 923 00:44:46,760 --> 00:44:49,600 helpful, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with 924 00:44:49,600 --> 00:44:52,640 colleagues, learners, or anyone working across the justice 925 00:44:52,640 --> 00:44:54,600 system. We'd also love to hear your 926 00:44:54,600 --> 00:44:57,000 thoughts or who you'd like to hear from next. 927 00:44:57,560 --> 00:45:00,280 A big thank you to Andy for sharing his experiences and to 928 00:45:00,280 --> 00:45:02,560 the team behind Probation Perspectives for bringing these 929 00:45:02,560 --> 00:45:05,600 conversations to life. We'll be back soon with more 930 00:45:05,600 --> 00:45:08,400 episodes that shine a light on the practise, purpose and people 931 00:45:08,400 --> 00:45:10,560 behind probation and community justice. 932 00:45:10,880 --> 00:45:12,560 Until next time, take care.