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Podcast Summary: The Rest Is Politics Episode 163 - Prison Reform, Masculinity, and Restorative Justice
Episode Overview In this episode of *The Rest Is Politics*, hosts Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell engage in a compelling discussion with playwright James Graham and campaigner Jacob Dunne. The episode focuses on themes of restorative justice, forgiveness, and the impact of masculinity on societal issues. Central to the discussion is Graham's play, *The Punch*, which dramatizes Dunne's journey following the tragic event where he killed someone as a teenager.
Key Themes and Discussions
Introduction to the Guests
- James Graham: Renowned playwright known for works that explore political and social themes.
- Jacob Dunne: A former offender who seeks to raise awareness about restorative justice, having served time for a crime that resulted in a death.
The Incident
- Jacob Dunne’s life changed dramatically after he threw a punch that killed James Hodgkinson, a trainee paramedic.
- The play *The Punch* illustrates Dunne's path towards seeking forgiveness and understanding from Hodgkinson's parents, which embodies the principles of restorative justice.
Restorative Justice
- Defined as a system focusing on the rehabilitation of offenders through reconciliation with victims.
- Dunne explains that his experience with restorative justice helped him confront the consequences of his actions, offering him a path forward.
- The guests discuss the societal stigma surrounding offenders and how restorative justice could change perceptions and outcomes.
The Role of Masculinity
- The conversation highlights the toxic aspects of masculinity that can lead to violence and poor decision-making in young men.
- Graham and Dunne explore the emotional toolkit provided to boys and men, which often lacks the tools for emotional expression and healthy coping mechanisms.
Forgiveness and Redemption
- The parents of Hodgkinson, especially his mother Joan, reached out to Dunne to engage in restorative justice, showcasing an extraordinary act of empathy and forgiveness.
- Dunne discusses his ongoing journey to forgive himself while acknowledging the pain he caused others.
- The guests reflect on the cultural narrative of victimhood and how society often struggles to offer forgiveness or understanding.
Society’s Perception of Justice
- The hosts discuss the challenges of political narratives surrounding crime, punishment, and reform.
- They raise concerns about the binary choice in public discourse: being "tough on crime" versus "soft on crime."
- The episode emphasizes the need for a nuanced conversation around justice that encompasses both accountability for victims and rehabilitation for offenders.
Takeaways from the Discussion
- Importance of Storytelling: The play serves as a medium to explore deep, often uncomfortable themes, allowing audiences to engage with complex human emotions and situations.
- Call for Change: Both Dunne and Graham advocate for systemic change in how society views crime, punishment, and the potential for rehabilitation through restorative justice initiatives.
- Hope for the Future: Dunne’s transformation from a life of crime to a campaigner for restorative justice illustrates the potential for change and the need for understanding and compassion in addressing criminal behavior.
Conclusion The episode underscores the need for society to rethink its approach to crime and punishment, embracing restorative justice not only as a means for rehabilitation but as a necessary element for healing for both victims and offenders. Through powerful storytelling and personal experiences, the discussion emphasizes the transformative power of understanding and forgiveness in a world often inclined towards blame and punishment.
Additional Notes
- The episode encourages listeners to engage with the Common Ground Justice Project to advocate for victim rights and restorative justice.
- Audiences are invited to see *The Punch* at the Apollo Theatre, which continues to resonate with themes of regret, redemption, and societal change.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Transcript
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3:31Welcome to The Restless Politics Leading with me, Rory Stewart. And me, Alistair Campbell. And I think this is the first doubleheader since we did two mayors, Andy Burnham and Andy Street. And this doubleheader is a gentleman that I always refer to as Britain's greatest living playwright. and that is James Graham and the real person subject of one of his many extraordinary pieces of theatre and that is a play called Punch which is has as the hero star anti-hero we'll come on to that Jacob Dunn. Jacob Dunn as a teenager in Nottingham threw a single punch in 2011 which resulted in the death of a trainee paramedic James Hodgkinson and James Graham has written a play about that incident, about Jacob, and about what followed afterwards, and in particular, the extraordinary encounter with the parents of the victim.
4:30Because James Hodgkinson's parents became involved in restorative justice, and they reached out to Jacob and began a painful journey of understanding and forgiveness. And it takes us right to the heart of the criminal justice system and our humility. So if you've seen the play, which many of you will have done, you'll know what we're talking about. And so will a lot of Americans because it's been on Broadway too. And if you haven't seen the play, it's on till November the 29th at the Apollo Theatre, London. Thank you all for coming. And it was an amazing play. Really, really moving. Thank you.
5:03And wonderful and highly recommended to everyone. It's really what you've done. I guess, Jacob, can I start with you? I mean, one thing that must be true is that you must be asked the same question again and again and again. Yeah. And tell us what that question is and how you think about answering it and how you continue to feel authentic when you're asked the same question 300 times. Yeah, I think it's probably more than 300 times over the last decade. And I've slowly been trying to move the dial forward and the answers, you know, change the answer, not change the answers, answer authentically, but pivot into moving forward.
5:40And the question that you're always asked is? And the question is, tell us about that punch that you threw that night. Why did you do it? How did it feel being arrested for murder? And then slowly as those questions move on and progress, it's about what was prison like? And then how did you feel when you heard of restorative justice and your victims? It's one issue here that in some sense a lot of these questions are fixing on something which is now further and further away in your life. Yeah, yeah. It's becoming further and further away in my life. And I often say it's a little bit like one of James' other famous plays.
6:23And I'm not comparing myself to Gareth Southgate by any means. But Gareth Southgate was defined by missing a penalty. Yeah. And he's only recently, as he became England manager and, you know, been successful as a football manager, that he's now redefined himself as, in a way, you could say he's more well known for being the England manager and the success he's had in recent years, rather than before that, it was that penalty. And do you feel when people ask you about that punch, people ask it from the point of view of there but for the grace of God go I, that they're feeling I could have done that.
6:56My God, that's awful how unlucky you were. Or is that not always the sense of the question? I don't think that's always the sense of the question. I think sometimes it is sensationalist. And for me personally, I don't think there's much more to be said or much benefit that can come from talking about The Punch. It's more what I've learned on the journey since then and the wider messages and the wider implications that my story can have and why it's resonating with audiences. Just before I go to answer, just to explain to listeners, and hope I've got this right, just so people can frame the conversation we're having.
7:32Jacob grew up in a quite difficult background in Nottingham, but in some ways you explain in your book and in the play that in other ways there were bits that's actually not very dissimilar to your own background growing up. And that you effectively were called in by friends and what was a fight outside a pub or... Yeah. ...and you hit someone and this man very tragically was killed as he hit the ground on his parents and reached out to you. Over to Alistair now. Yeah, I was going to start with you, James, by asking... I know you're a workaholic and you've written a lot of quite amazing plays and they all pretty much seem to hit a mark.
8:11and you tend to alight upon a person or a situation that speaks to something that you desperately want to write and talk about what was it in jacob's story that you felt this is for me i have to write a play about this it just was one of those rare stories i mean you're right i normally sort of like to take institutions at a moment in our recent history the whip's office or the Brexit referendum or the England football team, the men's football team. And at a moment of a crossroads or a tipping point, get in there and try to understand what that might say about a national character about us. This felt completely different.
8:50It was about an individual, but it was about a community, my community. I grew up in North Nottinghamshire. As Rory said, I grew up in the mining villages. Jacob grew up in the city. And I was tempted, I was compelled to look at it for that reason. But it's as you go through the story, it was that rare thing that it just does something to people and it does something to me every time I talk about it I always get very worried that I get very moved talking about it because I feel so inauthentic in your presence Jacob getting emotional about it because it's not my pain it's not my trauma but people do seem to get really affected by it and I think it's the idea in a quite cruel age or a difficult time just like the most remarkable act of forgiveness and compassion and kindness in the form of what the victim's parents did with Jacob and what Jacob did with the parents and that's a coming together across a divide and we talk about divides all the time you guys do but the most chasmous divide you can possibly have somebody lost their son and they had to reach out to the person who took him it's also very complicated story incredibly complicated you make it there's a simple narrative that you drive but it's a very it was a complicated process and the reason why I was hesitant to say hero because i think in a way the parents are the heroes yeah that's certainly what i would say yeah but when you were writing it were you and you clearly even now i can see you get emotional just thinking about it what what we what story were you trying to tell i think when an audience sits there and they've now heard about before they walk into the theater so it's a different kind of relationship from when we started i think they often sit down with the central provocation, which is could you imagine you personally imagining forgiving or going as close to forgiveness as you can to the person who harmed you most in the world.
10:36And I think most people sit down as the lights go down at 7.30 and think, no, I can't wait to see the story. I can't wait to understand what it's like to be Jacob growing up in a difficult environment, going to prison, being involved in male violence, in those toxic male relationships. I can't wait to meet the parents and see how they recame their grief in this way through restorative justice. but I think people sit down going I would never be able to do that and I wanted to explore that the process it's not dissimilar from the whips how does the whips office work how does grief work but actually it is about systems and without without turning Jacob into a metaphor or an allegory it is a bit like this Dickensian story of an individual who pretty much goes through all of our systems he's a working class kid and they pretty much all failed all failed him Jacob always takes personal responsibility for his actions but the schools failed him and social services failed him and the courts failed him and prison and probation and he's a person who's walked through most of our systems and for me as a political playwright that felt an exciting way to look at the last 10 years of austerity and where we are today it's actually there's an amazing character in the play who is a sociology lecturer yeah your lecture yeah he was my psychology teacher yeah yeah but he sort of comes on and he produces these kind of great statements and we kind of get that that other side of you as a playwright where he's like austerity thatcher you know it's kind of system it's a bit smaller than that but yeah well actually i love the way you do it because in a sense you're also poking fun at yourself because you've created the kind of sociological narrative through another character so it's not you lecturing us so much as a guy who's both authentic, but also slightly eccentric producing this narrative.
12:14But I was also very interested in this question of forgiveness and redemption. If I was looking at the dominant theme of our culture, I think we often seem very unforgiving. If you look at the headline in a newspaper, so-and-so is evil. Often a public figure could be a politician. They've done something absolutely terrible. And there's a real drive. They must be punished. They must be held accountable. There's very little room for the idea of forgiveness, very little room for saying, that could be me. This person's going to have a chance to turn that around. They're going to be forgiven. I feel we're a very vengeful, angry culture that wants to find people to go after.
12:57I agree. And it's probably to us ever thus, but in the last 10, 15 years, and you've witnessed this, the discourse has changed to being one of competing and one of winning. And think of all the YouTube thumbnail headlines, owning, crushing, destroying is celebrated. The president of the United States is celebrated for being a bully, for standing on top of people and winning in that way. There's very little celebration of compassion and empathy. But I would always argue and I always advocate for drama, storytelling, and particularly theatre in this space, unlike social media, which is a very responsive, reactive, and competitive form of discourse.
13:39Theatre demands that you, one, turn off your phone, which is brilliant, and for a couple of hours, walk in the footsteps of someone else you probably disagree with, someone you think you wouldn't have normally supported, and try to understand them, try to understand why they behave the way they do. But Roy, you've kind of touched on the main reason I wanted to come on the show, to be honest, and that's about the narrative is stuck and I don't know how much more we're going to talk about the play and in what order but the central theme of the play is that all the characters are stuck and they don't know how to move forward and then when you broaden that out as a lens you look at the justice system that is a debate that's been stuck for decades the prison crisis the overpopulation people being released early and a debate about justice reform is stuck in terms of tough on crime soft on crime And that's the parallels between the story of individual characters, David and Joan being stuck in their grief, not getting answers from the justice system, not feeling supported as victims, not knowing how to move forward after the loss of their son.
14:42And me feeling pessimistic about the world and not thinking I could enter the job market, not feeling like I could contribute, no qualifications, no fixed address on release of prison, kind of bleak future ahead. and yet through asking the right questions which is what restorative justice does being able to look at everybody's needs listen deeply across divides and actually find a way if everybody's willing to engage and participate in the conversation to find a way forward with problematic solutions that get everybody's needs met and that's about that's what my organization now is called is called the common ground justice projects and that's what we're seeking to do is to unstuck the public debate and find pragmatic solutions to to move us forward you said bleak you're facing a bleak future do you think if joan and david had not been the people that they are or that they certainly became and were able particularly joan to forgive you and it struck me both from reading your book and from watching the play genuinely forgive you in her case and not being critical of the dad i just think he had a much tougher process to go through what would you what do you think your life would have been what where do you can you i know it's impossible to say because your life has become what it's become but what was your sense of what your life was going to be well it was just the same as same as always and just filling time dossing about in and out of jail probably committing low-level crime just doing whatever I needed to do to get by and fill the void and try and because the problem is is that I didn't have a goal I didn't have goals I didn't have a purpose and that's what the state of a lot of young people I saw people coming in that business they don't have a goal or purpose or relationships how did they how did they unlock your sense of purpose by making me care about myself and showing me that I was worthy of of caring about myself and trying to find figure out some goals and and not wanting to hurt any more of a people and so it was through those connections so it's those human relationships it's those relationships if you have good pro-social connections to society to your community you won't want to hurt your community or harm your community you want to contribute to your community and and having the people who I'd harm the most actually take an interest in me and want me to go and get an education want me to get into employment want me to contribute to society was enough of a motivation initially and a purpose.
17:16That was my purpose. It was, I don't want to let Dave and Joan down. I want to create a new narrative for myself. Forgiveness is a really tough idea, isn't it? Because you're saying, okay, that's done. You're forgiven and you're going to move forward and you're going to live your life to full. And that always leaves people thinking, yeah, but is he taking responsibility enough for that? Is he acknowledging enough for this? Yeah. Maybe people want you to feel kind of guilty to show that you want assumption. So how, as somebody who's been through this, how does forgiveness work? How do you get that balance right?
17:51Why do humans find this concept of forgiveness and letting you move forward difficult? I think the remarkable part about Punch is that often people come to see the play and maybe leave the play. And in one of the post-show conversations, we have post-shows every Tuesday night, one of which Alistair's joining us for on the 25th of November, is that they think we had a question in one of the post shows and people asked the question, David and Joan, are you Christian? Is there an element of faith in this? Because we know, you know, and religion, you know, often talks about, you know, the need to forgive.
18:23In order to move on more forward, more than anything, it's a gift to yourself, is forgiveness in order to not, you know, be trapped and consumed by bitterness and anger and hate, which will manifest in, you know, everyone else around you. and from the conversations I had with Joan particularly is she was she wasn't recognizing who the person she was anymore people around her didn't recognize who she was she didn't want and she says about her son she says my son wouldn't want me to become the person that I'm becoming and so forgiveness for them wasn't a religious kind of motivate it wasn't motivated by religious context it was made motivated by a need to be able to live well or to be I think James uses a quote in the play to become the best version of myself and for you and for me that's a very tricky journey which I'm still on I find it hard to truly say I forgive myself and I think a lot of my work sometimes is motivated by guilt, which isn't healthy either.
19:30And that need to want to give back and need to try and make an impact in the world and need to try and help young people and stop more punches being thrown and find the common ground in public discourse and try and make as much good come from this story as possible. But that's going to be a lifelong journey of mine. And that's one thing I'd say about, a lot of people say about punitive sentences, taking part in restorative justice for me and really looking at the mother and father, David and Joan, in the eyes and seeing the grief in their eyes and them telling me about their son, that's a lifelong sentence.
20:05I've opened my heart to that now and I can't. I can never not remember that. Do you think it matters if you don't forgive yourself? I think the way it matters, it's almost like there's a threshold where it does matter if it becomes problematic, if it means that I don't take care of myself because I feel so bad about myself. and that's what I would say is a big problem with people in prison, people who are suffering with substance misuse, people who have mental health issues. A lot of that can be triggered by a lifetime of shame, a lifetime of trauma, a lifetime of not forgiving yourself. But you're using it to motivate yourself to do the good things that you're doing.
20:40Yeah. So I'm happy in that place, but I just always know that it's a balance. Yeah. And I've been on both sides of that balance at various times, especially when the story becomes more, or when I'm asked that original question, most of the time which is tell me about the worst thing you ever did jamesy i mean listening to jacob now right unbelievably articulate has thought a lot of things through and he's very clever and i'm imagining you grew up with lots of young you know teenagers and young men who probably were out on the streets and causing trouble and dealing drugs and doing all the stuff that Jacob did what did what had to happen to somebody like Jacob do you think to go from the life that he was sort of felt he was being dragged into to the life that he leads now and how can that be done without him ending up in jail for a while yeah I mean I've had to think about this a lot because obviously as a playwright if I was treating Jacob as a fictional character you have to work out motivations objections obstacles what is the turning point that takes them onto this extraordinary journey.
21:47The brilliant thing about Jacob being alive and next to me is I get to keep asking him, but you find it kind of thing that Harley's question as well, that what the moment was that you transformed in that way. Rory, I remember you said that question there, but for the grace of God. I think most drama gets under our skin for that reason. We like to sit back and think we're just observers on human nature, but when any of us are put in a difficult situation, do we become the best version of ourselves or the worst? And I think that's what compels people to watch drama. I think a lot about the fork in the road that was my life and your life, Jacob, growing up in Nottingshire.
22:20I was the same working class family. I lived with my single mum. But so much went right for me, whether that was luck or anything else. My parents read to me and encouraged me to be creative. I went to an underfunded, huge comprehensive school, but had an amazing drama teacher who just decided that working class kids should do plays it gave me a passion a purpose the thing that that void that you spoke of my void and there's loads of i was nervous and shy and confused about myself it was filled sort of very quickly but you always think gosh had it not been like what are the what are the triggers for me that would have meant i made appalling decisions i remember going out a lot like that moment when you're 15 16 17 you have to start going out downtown getting the bus and it just wasn't my world and i hated it and there was i mean this was also what compelled me to look at the play it's setting like a market town in the midlands and a saturday night and a lot of people recognize that kind of throb of threat or violence around the market square behind the pub and yeah there were lads like you who i would bump into and think oh my god i'm never going to survive this it's going to be awful and i wanted to kind of understand that like what that You know, in that is class, in that is masculinity, in that is culture, British culture, how we, the rhythm of life, Friday nights, Saturday nights, after work.
23:43I don't think we answer those questions, but I want to sort of understand it. But to go back to your question, yeah, I don't think I ever would have been that kind of man. I just don't think it was in my DNA, but I think about the best versions of myself and the worst a lot. Push it one stage further. So at the moment, an example of somebody that people would find very difficult to empathize with would be, let's say, an Afghan immigrant who abused an underage minor, raped a woman. Would you be able to write a play about that? Would you be able to help an audience find empathy for that person? I think if I'm to stick to my principle that any story is valid and understanding any person's motivation so that we can understand human nature or the systems that we've surrounded ourselves with is a really valid thing.
24:26It's not about forcing empathy. And empathy is different from sympathy. Empathy is just the act of wanting to know why. I love how Jacob describes the thing that unlocked him. No one had asked him before what he wanted to do and why he was doing it. It took the parents of the person he killed to ask that question. So it's just about questions. And yes, I wouldn't enjoy writing it. I don't think an audience would enjoy sitting through it. But to ask the question, what happened to get that man into that place where he did that thing is always valid. And it's an interesting question, isn't it, about what we can handle and what we can't as an audience.
25:02I mean, is it possible that an audience can handle something horrible and tragic, like Jacob killing somebody with a punch, better than they can handle something like child abuse? And yet that too is an exercise in empathy, forgiveness, understanding. I mean, how does one get to the stage of being able to inhabit things which are right at the edge of what the public can bear to think about? I don't think I can answer that, but I think it is the function and always has been the function for thousands of years since ancient Greece, that you put the worst aspects of humanity and the darkness of our soul on stage.
25:43It is different for Jacob because, as you described, it's never about apologizing for it. And I was taken to task rightly by David, the father of James. I'd started to accidentally, ironically, put the word accident a lot in my script. And he called me and said, it wasn't an accident. You never throw a punch accidentally. Jacob didn't mean to kill James, but it wasn't an accident. He chose to throw that punch. And sorry, I'm not going to interrupt, but I'm sort of developing this obsession I've got. But I think many things that we do, which are evil, we don't do deliberately, either because we haven't fully thought it through or we haven't had the empathy to think of the harm that we're causing to other people.
26:24But often the people that we portray as the most evil people probably don't see themselves as being evil. They lie to themselves. They conceal what they're doing. They think what they're doing is more innocent than it actually is. And certainly, even when I do small things, I do that to myself. I just want to, I mean, how do you think about this as a way? This is kind of what we're trying to do at the common ground justice project because the way this is why the debate is stuck and yes you've you've brought up a very controversial highly emotion emotive topic an example but the way that things work let's talk about people just criminals for example the debate is shame and blame and same in the political discourse you know there's a there's something gone wrong let's you know lammy or you know whoever the secretary of state is for whatever department something's gone wrong Horrible Tories and austerity.
27:15It's just horrible Tories and austerity. It's always like the easy answer, shame and blame, shame and blame. But what people actually really want is people to be accountable and remorseful and to own up and to take responsibility. So that's the difference with this story that James is talking about. If you're going to take that Afghan refugee or you're going to talk about somebody else, a different example, I think the preconditions, the same way the preconditions to entering a restorative justice conversation are that all parties have to enter it voluntarily but especially for the perpetrator they have to accept responsibility and they have to be remorseful and otherwise you can't have the conversation and so that's kind of like what we're trying to do at the common ground justice project is you try and engage people across political divides to enter into a conversation about justice so that we can get beyond the soundbites and the headlines and move beyond move beyond that and really try and find what the public really wants from justice reform do they instead of rehabilitation and or punishment because we went to the reform party we hosted a fringe event at the reform party conference and we found that eight in ten people at the reform party members wanted the prison system to do both rehabilitation and punishment but if you ask them either or it would have been very high on the scale of punishment so if you go beyond that simple you know argument you do find the nuance how far were you down the road towards the bleak future when you heard about even the concept of restorative justice and how did you hear about it and how did it come about?
28:51In my case, it came about through my probation officer. So I came out of prison. My probation officer said... You hadn't heard about it in prison? I've never heard about it in prison, no. And I go into prisons a lot now and lots of men in there are saying, we've seen you on TV, we've heard you on prison radio, and they'll go, I never heard of restorative justice. I didn't even know I could say sorry to my victims. I didn't even know I could express remorse. And that's the problem with the design of prisons is that we all have this assumption that people in prison don't care about the harm they've caused.
29:22But actually the way it's designed doesn't allow them to express remorse, doesn't allow them to contribute because they're out of sight, out of mind, in sales 24 hours a day or not really got the opportunity to do anything meaningful. But then when they see me coming in, they're like, can you give me, who's my local service provider for a story of justice? how do I say sorry to my victims? But in my case, to answer your question, Alistair, when I came out of prison, saw my probation officer, she then said, we've had a referral from your victims through an organization called Remedy, and they want to ask you some questions.
29:58So they were aware of it and they were driving it? The victims, my victims were aware of it. It took them a long time to become aware of it. and this is what I mean about trying to get people unstuck because they at first were asking the prison estate, what's Jacob doing? Is he doing alcohol-related violence cause? Is he sorting out his mental health? Is he involved in education? What is he doing in there? Is he aware of the harm he's caused? And were you aware of their massacre? No, I wasn't aware of this. And they were getting told it's data protection. We can't tell you this. And the play highlights that frustration of David and Joan going, why aren't we getting any answers?
30:35One thing that just, I mean, as somebody who spent a bit of my time working on prisons, is hearing that it's just so far from the reality of what prisons are now. I mean, yeah, theoretically, there's an education course, there's an alcohol reduction course, but in practice, it's in lockdown a lot. You might be in a cell 23 hours out of 24. You turn up to education, and there are seven people at very different levels around. The poor teachers trying to hold half the people looking out the window. So the gap between the story and actually what's going on is just terrible. I mean, we have a sort of idea that maybe restorative justice is some Scandinavian system with kind of Swedish prison officers sitting down working closely.
31:24It's like you're lucky if it's 10 minutes a week of someone chatting to you. And nobody, nobody professional would think that, I saw this with suicide prevention. I remember seeing somebody who tried to take their own life sitting with a trained officer who was saying, don't you feel a bit guilty about what you did? How about your kids? How are they going to feel? How are they going to feel? And I'm sitting there thinking, wait, wait, I don't know much about this, but I don't think that's what you're supposed to say to somebody who's just tried to kill themselves, right? But that was the best that was being provided.
31:55So the gap between what actually is going on. Go on. Yeah. So that is a perfect example of when I first went into custody, into Young Offenders Institute, the notorious Glenn Parva, which has now been knocked down and is a new super prison, Foss Way, which I went and visited. When I went in there, they printed off the newspaper articles, the prison officers of my mugshots. And it said, killer, murderer, fog, teen, only gets 30 months for manslaughter. And then the Daily Mail was there and they printed off all the comment sections. And this was them trying to do some victim awareness with me. And they were like, look at what the public thinks of you.
32:33And you can imagine, I don't know if I'm allowed to say words.
32:38So, you know, I told the prison officers, fuck off. I said, go and do one. How dare you? But they were triggering my shame. And that's what I mean about that shame and blame culture. We can't shame and blame our way into making people change. But it's madness because it's a total absence of any professionalism and training. I mean, part of the problem is you're taking, people can join the prison service, start working on the landings at the age of 18. They will often be on a landing with two or three people. There's no supervisory officers. There's no custodial management. The training course is a few weeks long.
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33:05They're being asked to do incredibly complicated things, dealing with some of the most complicated people on earth. They're supposed to be part teacher, part police officer, part social worker, part riot control officer, part therapist. And it's just not there. We're not investing in creating that kind of system remotely and the four of us saying you know we need to do more you know i don't know the new prison that's replaced that replaced glen parva yeah so you've been back is it better yeah well it's it's um it's run by surco um so it's a private prison um it's 2400 spaces i think and i went and visited for an itv documentary i did and had a look around obviously i was given a censored view of you know i was told i was you know i was i didn't get free roam of the prison you know like an inspector would i was handpicked the people who i would interview and the wings i was allowed to go on to um but it did it did seem a lot it did seem better in terms of there was more programs on in there it's a category c resettlement prison so it's got this emphasis on trying to get people ready for reintegration but i still hear stories that people have been released with tents you know because there's no housing you know and as you raise that point in the play don't you James is like word of warning.
34:19I think Wendy, my probation officer says word of warning. I'm not going to spoil it. So it's a great, it's a great, it's a great line, but it's a word of warning, Jacob. There is, there's a long list. It's a long waiting list for housing, but there is no housing, you know, it's a bit better. But, but yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's one of those, it's one of those real big problems. Okay. James, Jacob, Alistair, quick break and then back for more.
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37:37play. James, the play's going to Broadway. It's just been actually. Yeah, yeah. Does an American audience, because the thing I found about watching it, and I grew up part of my childhood in my teenage years in Leicester, which isn't far from Nottingham, isn't that different, but you know, it's quite a tricky accent. Oh God, yeah. It's a weird accent. It's so weird, because it's not quite northern, not quite northern. And it also sounds quite posh in bits. Yeah, but listen to me. I mean, mine's morphed into an aristocratic kind of weird thing. But yeah, it's... So do you think the Americans get this...
38:10Are they dealing with all the same issues? They are, and in some cases to greater extremes. It's a different thing. But yes, they did. And we worked very hard on our accents. But in a way, what makes the story... Did you have to change the accents? No, we trained these Americans to do a Nottingham. But I wasn't thinking about the actors. I was thinking about the audience. We had to dial it down so they could comprehend every third word. but what was universal about this story is what really got under the skin of the, and actually they got, sitting in that Broadway house, they would get more emotional, American audiences are generally more emotional and they get to their feet very quickly, they would actually applaud at the end of this scene, the big scene in the play which is when Jacob meets David and Joan as part of the restorative justice and they begin unpicking what happened and people got very emotional, people used to applaud and I think it's because they're going through a similar existential crisis over there in terms of certainly the justice system and the prison system and young men and it failing a lot of young men.
39:10I think what they're going through in terms of their political culture, a very toxic, cruel, unpleasant place. Again, the superhuman act of forgiveness that they demonstrated as parents and characters just got under their skin. Absolutely. James, can I ask you, what did you understand about masculinity and young men. You've described yourself as a young man in Nottingham, not really fitting the sort of Jacob image. I mean, I can't totally imagine you feeding the bars, getting smashed and having fights in bars, right? And maybe I'm being unfair to you. No, when Jacob was doing that, I was figure skating in Nottingham Arena.
39:45Right, very good. In my little tights. It was a good spot by Torvalundi. Yeah, great Nottingham couple, yeah. So that's another really interesting thing, given that you're very different. what is it that you had to learn about that type of masculinity in order to represent it yeah and how would you define it what's surprising about it what what is it that people don't quite understand about what's going on in this sort of classic image of the 18 to 25 year old kind of macho aggressive young man yeah that's a great question i mean you revert to cliches don't you about the male condition and how we cope but i jacob speaks way more eloquent about this so i should pass to him but he talks about like an emotional toolkit and what emotional as we grow up whether that's our parents our culture our music our friends the culture what it puts into our toolkit and as a bloke i mean what was put into my toolkit was it's okay to cry james so i did lots and and it is okay and it is well there i was listening um and it really i think i go back to this idea which is always the key in drama what when when you are under pressure in a moment someone's just told you they're leaving you or someone's just told you pushed you against the wall and said i want to fight in that moment you open your kit and what do you pull out and i would have pulled out tears often or running away jacob had a different emotional toolkit and it's about i think about this a lot in terms of what gareth southgate did in the play jacob referenced dear england these young men who we thought of as being quite spoiled privileged millionaires not caring enough to turn up every day and do well something else was wrong people didn't want to acknowledge that these young men were really scared and anxious and not handling the pressure very well.
41:21Gareth Southgate tried to go on a psychological journey of creating resilience. And I love that word actually, and you talk about that eloquently, Jacob. It's not about the painting of restorative justice or any of this warm and fuzzy stuff to do with men, stroking them and hugging them and going, it's okay. It's not because it's nice, it's not because it makes us feel good, or even because it's the right thing to do. It's actually building in a generation of young men, the resilience to go when things don't go your way and they will often not go your way. How you behave, how you conduct yourself, which takes practice and learning will define you.
41:56And I was just very lucky that my toolkit had different things in than yours. And that's massively important. This is what Punch is all about, all the work I'm trying to do at the moment is about conversations. It's about communication and how good the discourse is if we're reducing everything to headlines, soundbites, blame, shame culture, no one's going to learn the tools and everyone's going to be getting triggered because, oh, I've, I've said the wrong thing. Now I'm racist. How do I come back from that? How do I respond to that? You know what I mean? And so we're always caught in these like really toxic debates.
42:29And so going back to what James was saying, he was exposed to the arts. He was exposed to drama. He was exposed to healthy relationships and ways and cultures and places and spaces where he was able to express himself when he's able to find the words to articulate himself understand himself follow passions whereas for me and for some other people who don't get exposed to those types of relationships or don't have the curiosity or the encouragement to explore themselves in certain safe spaces to make sense of themselves then are on the back foot and are always kind of cautious what are your friends the friends that you were involved with and the the group that you went as it were to defend because you felt this is my tribe and it's under attack and i've got to go and defend it what's happened to all of them um well eventually as you know there's a there's a crime curve um and so eventually you know i'm 33 now so most of my friends are over 30 or coming up to 30 and um most people kind of like naturally stop committing crime by the time they reach their 30s apart from you know those who kind of see no way possible out of it because they haven't got into a relationship they haven't had kids they haven't had a um you know they haven't sorted out their mental health or they haven't had most of your friends ended up most of my friends now are okay they have like their own businesses or they've um you know and there's a few that are dead or in prison for a long time because that's just what happens the risk you run if you live that lifestyle for 10 years from 18 to 28 you know eventually you're going to get caught out the same way I was but I was caught out very early tragically and there's all those tragic stories that happen but hopefully most people tend to kind of eventually make it out if they haven't died or ended up in prison or have become mentally ill and unable to you know I've got a lot of schizophrenia friends or people who are kind of going to be on welfare for the rest of their lives now because of the stuff they've experienced and the drugs that they've taken James one thing that comes out in the play it's the moment when you're talking about turning up at your secondary school.
44:37And I think, I can't remember the exact line, James will remind us of it, but basically you say there are two bunches of people and one group is fun. One of the things that it gets lost when we talk about, you know, you weren't given an emotional opportunity to explore figure skating and drama and this, that, and the other, is that presumably from the point of view of a 16, 17 year old, there's a sense in which he would rather be Jacob than James, right? Oh, gosh, yeah. And so I think that's something that also isn't acknowledged, which is the, and that's another thing that comes up beautifully in the play, which is that strange sense that when you're seeing you, Jacob, age 16, 17, as an adult, you seem a bit kind of shy and sullen and your eyes are down.
45:16But when you're with your friends, you're lighting up, you're becoming this larger-than-life charismatic figure. Well, there's two lines in the play that speak to this. There's the opening lines, which is, you know, addicted to drama um and this need to like it is a great metaphor for the play and the drama and theater and youth culture is that addiction to drama that addiction to adrenaline addiction to feeling alive when everything else might seem so bleak uh but then the other one later on in the play is doing doing bad things creates good feelings and you know that i always feel uncomfortable with that line but i is i think it is true to an extent is that still true no Never It depends What you define as bad Doesn't it Alistair I don't know What you define as bad Would you agree with that Quote Doing bad things Creates good feelings I'm not sure I do Was he not right When you were 18, 19 Did you not feel a bit Like him sometimes I did get in a lot of fights Far too many But it didn't make me feel good Did you get a sort of Sense of buzz Adrenaline, excitement Not really, no Did you ever throw a punch yeah but you were more you were more depressive right yeah yeah yeah because you know what because that line like as a parent now like i would like my son staying out too late when he gets older i'd probably class as bad thing or drinking too much as a bad thing but i guess as a young person you're not really classing that as a bad thing i don't think i ever had a fight and felt good about it afterwards what was interesting reading your book i got the feeling that it happened and then you went back to your life yeah it was normalized it was yeah this was and it was only really and it was interesting as well you're brutally honest about this when then it started to become you started to think maybe this isn't going away your feelings are all about yourself yeah shit how do i get out of this i've got to get rid of all my clothes i've got to delete all my social media posts i can't say where i was that night so you're panicking about yourself so it's a long time before you're starting to think yeah there's somebody else involved in this yeah and it's very difficult to put yourself in other people's shoes and that's what we hope this play does quite well i think in from the reception that it's getting is it puts you you kind of forced as an audience to be able to if not empathize at least put yourself in the shoes of all the characters from all perspectives so let me ask you to put your yourselves both of you in the shoes of the politicians so you've said you know it's either tough on crime or soft on crime you know we're seeing this debate at the moment playing out in all sorts of different ways who's toughest on crime do you understand why that has come about can you see why for example if if david lammy would stand up and say too many people in prison we're gonna we're gonna cut investment in prisons we're gonna massively ramp up uh investment in restorative justice can you see it from their perspective well the thing is that i can see it from their perspective and i am encouraging them to do this so restorative justice i think it's the wrong example but i know what you mean so a better example of that would be if we're gonna employ a load of therapists at the cost of two billion pounds to be in every prison then you'd have that up rail but in terms of restorative justice i don't think that is um i don't think would you would you support doing that if there the money available but i know as you know i'm a pragmatist you know i understand to a degree you know what civil what goes on in civil service what goes on with the conversation with the treasury what goes on in terms of how government works to a degree enough to know that i can't just come wandering on on air going this needs to happen and this needs to happen and you know i mean because it's just wishful thinking but you do think if they were to commit to restorative justice that would end up with a lot less crime i think yeah in terms of restorative justice and i think The reason why restorative justice isn't something where the Daily Mail are all of a sudden going to go, this is despicable.
49:15How can people be doing restorative justice? Because at the heart of it, restorative justice is about empowering victims. Our campaign is called The Right to Be Heard, which is about giving every victim information about restorative justice and making them aware of their rights. Because at the moment, only one in 20 victims of crime recall being offered restorative justice. And this isn't something that's going to cost the Treasury more money. this just means that the police the courts at all stages of the justice system they make victims aware that restorative justice is an option and i'm not saying that restorative justice is for every victim of crime it might it might not be at the start when they first report a crime because that's probably when they're going to be most angry but by the time time passes on they might be more open to it they might go actually the same way david and joan did my victims i'm really angry at the sentence length i'm going to try and appeal then they try to appeal and they can't get it repealed then later on they go actually what matters to us is holding jacob accountable making him aware of the impact that he's had asking him questions and i think that's every victim of crime should have that right to enter the restorative justice you've written several plays that are actually i would argue very sympathetic about politics and politicians it's getting harder but yeah it might be getting better but you have done that and i just wonder whether it's the same question to you really whether you could put yourself in shoes that say well this sounds great but I'm not sure we can get we can do it without a doubt well then I'd like to flip it back to you guys and you tell us what you think you would do but it is it's it's I would say this wouldn't I it's about narrative and successful storytelling the the most successful story at the moment in our mainstream politics that we've convinced ourselves is that what people want to hear is being tough on on sentencing and tough on disciplinary justice is effective so I of course have sympathy we know why David Lammy would be reticent about standing up and going instead of building more prison places and investing in the end of the crime.
51:07We're going to invest more money now in preventative measures, socially, emotionally, in communities, young men, to spend more money now to save money later and to prevent these people from causing harm in the first place. That, to me, sounds like a rational choice from a rational society, but we don't live in a rational society. And that story is not winning and that story is never won. Those conservative, possibly, parts of the media would react that that is a weak government being weak on crime. It's too soft. It's too woolly. It's too woke. It's too progressive. Whereas we know, and Jacob knows personally, painting restorative justice as being easy or soft is such a mischaracterization.
51:46It is about the hardest thing you can ask an offender and a victim to go through, but it is muscular. It's robust. It's evidence-based. The re-offending rate in this country is what now, 25, 30 %? Short sentence, it's 60%. Yeah, so it's what,£51 ,000 a year to house a prisoner. Why would any society, to feel good about themselves, rather spend£51 ,000 a year putting Jacob back in prison than spending a grand on restorative justice? We can talk about this at a great deck. The answer is it isn't£1 ,000 against£51 ,000. And if it were, the Treasury would be doing it. It's not just about the Daily Mail.
52:22But I wanted to sort of move on a little bit from prison policy and prison stuff where I agree with so much what you're saying. I think the truth is actually you can do a lot more. I mean, I was prisons minister. I was pushing to get rid of short sentences. I was pushing for safer prisons. I was very much involved in that stuff. And I was attacked by the Daily Mail. I had managed a headline, Minister gives green light to criminals. But we knew it was coming. We'd prepared for it. We thought about what we were doing and we were able to get space. Can I just say one thing before we move on from that debate?
52:53That's the one thing that we're trying to do. So I just want to say to the audience and politically minded people, if you do want to support us, the Commonwealth Justice Project and our Right to Be Heard campaign to make restorative justice a legal right for all victims of crime, please do sign the petition at the righttobeheard.org. and check out our work at the Common Ground Justice Project because what we're trying to do is, and as we're concluding our conversation about justice, is you have, we know what works in terms of reducing reoffending. And then what we're interested in doing at the Common Ground Justice Project is figuring out what the public wants.
53:26So over the next few years, and we need support, whether that's resources or researchers or anybody that wants to help us with a non-political organisation to figure out what the public wants on justice so that we can match what works with what the public wants and then give the government good pragmatic policies that are backed by what the public want. So there's not always this kind of caution or indecisiveness within the government around what should we do? Are we going to get a balance from this? So we're doing the hard work around what the public wants and suggesting policies and ideas that are backed by what the public want.
54:01I think it's wonderful work. I also think government can have a bit more courage. It doesn't need to be quite as frightened as it is. But you were about to say that the reaction to you doing that was... But it wasn't a problem. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. You know the data that's going to say it. You've prepared for it. You've talked to everyone at number 10 about it. They know the headlines coming. Yeah. So when we were in office and we were doing, you know, with the framing of tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime, what we were more interested in probably was the causes of crime.
54:29Of course, yeah. But at least you said that. You said the second bit. You're off that way. you've got the second bit and i think what yours i think where you both rise this point about storytelling yeah you know if if people want to drive a certain narrative that says all asylum seekers are bad all immigrants are bad all criminals are bad we should lock up everybody sentences should be longer and there's nobody really coming back at that in the political space then it's very very difficult do you feel you are moving the dial yeah do you do you is that just a feeling or do you have any kind of well well i feel that we i can't do it we can't do it alone a piece of theatre can start the debate and we're in the news we're in the press we're part of the national conversation on crime now we wouldn't even be part of the conversation so by definition in that sense yes we're having an impact but moving forward we you know that's i want to create this common ground space where we can actually come together across political divides to create a community and a movement where more people can become engaged in this kind of thing because we can't do it alone.
55:30So when you said earlier that, you know, we're finding out what the public really think, what happens if the public really think that we've got to go even further? Well, from the polling that we've done so far, we've got a report called Course Correction that's out and we want to do more polling to understand what we've realised is some emerging common ground that we need some more, you know, to say bluntly funding to be able to do some more research to understand really what the public wants. But that's our ambition is to confidently be able to say this is what the public wants. But so far, we've got some emerging ground that we want to keep investigating.
56:06And that's why we launched our Right to Be Heard campaign, because we do know that people care about victims' rights. That is a vote winner. That is something that the public care about. And then we can move on to, OK, OK, what kind of policies would people back in terms of encouraging rehabilitation? I mean, my penny worth on this is the way to get the public there is to make sure that you absolutely acknowledge the misery that victims go through, the chaos that criminals cause, the horror that impacts people's lives, and then move on to talking about how to make prisons better, reform, et cetera.
56:36One of the problems with liberals is they just seem to be blind to actually what it's like to be a victim. But that leads me to my next point, I kind of shift on that. Victims. So much of our culture is about victims. We're talking about very specific technical victims in crime, but we all see ourselves as victims. We're victims of austerity, we're victims of Brexit, we're victims of Trump, we're victims of globalization, we're victims of capitalism, we're victims of the class structure, we're victims of ethnic structures, we're victims of - Rory's going very left wing. And I wondered what that means for people's way of looking at the world and what's some of the problems of creating a culture of victimhood.
57:16Because I think in the end, populist politics is about the weaponization of a sense that you are a victim. Yes, that something has been done to you or something has been taken from you and that you don't have a voice. The most successful, most impactful political slogan of the last 10 years, take back control, is about that lack of agency. So I agree with that. What's the downside? side well the plus sides of that of course we would always encourage you to understand what you're feeling and and um what you what voice or what you're lacking in in your life and to interrogate that of course there's a downside to that which is if it if it serves to um create resentment um and resentment is quite core to contemporary culture isn't huge yeah i i know across the divide as well whether that's people from our community working class resentment or i know quite privileged educated people who still feel resentful for some reason that something is something is not right.
58:09Donald Trump feels profoundly resentful about life, doesn't he? Yeah, in a sociopathically childlike, narcissistic way. He's like, every day the most powerful man in the world. He's really angry that he's the most powerful man in the world. It's infuriating, but it's... I would say this, wouldn't I? But I just think that's why, for me, all of the platforms, all of the mechanisms we've been given to try and understand this feeling are algorithmically designed to create more of the same feeling. Social media. Exactly. or whatever that is, any of the forums that we... Which is why podcasts like this are so important.
58:42Absolutely. Taking people beyond the binary. But it is also an act of... I can only really now think of drama and storytelling and theatre, and this is why I'm so relieved, the news recently, that arts are going back on the core curriculum as a way for a younger generation who feel all of this resentment and all of this sense of powerlessness and a complete lack of hope or belief that tomorrow is going to be better than today. So of course they're anxious and feeling upset and disenfranchised. There is just something about the power of storytelling, of framing something whereby the exercise is going cause and effect.
59:19Someone does something, there is a consequence to this. Why do people do that and what is the impact on that? I think it's literally about the only space where we even are encouraged to think like that anymore, which is why the collapse of reading, the collapse of long form narratives where you have to walk through someone's shoes. I really worry about that, but that's a very woolly way of going, more drama would solve the world. Yeah, there's a stat here that I just wanted to bring in because it reinforces this point. 54 % of the public say people like them are powerless to change things in Britain, rising to 74 % of reformed UK supporters.
59:52And so I think it was non-voters were 66%. So reformed voters are even higher, feel even more powerless than non-voters. So I think that kind of like speaks to that kind of sense that people aren't feeling heard. People don't feel part of the conversation. People's living standards are falling. People want to feel heard. And yet the problem is the politicians themselves feel powerless. You know, they feel they're in a globalized world. They've got Trump. They've got the markets. I mean, we're almost setting ourselves up for failure that, you know, we're all feeling we want to be heard. We want to have power.
1:00:24And some of those things, the whole structures of the modern world are not delivering for us. so all we deliver are parties that promise that we'll give you that but can't actually do it well that comes back to even in the conservative time what was um cameron's policy around like devolution and localized big society big society and all that kind of stuff leveling up and all that kind of stuff that that's that that is the kind of you know on the macro scale what we need it's you know that's what we need is that but it doesn't happen and and it but it also comes to it's not everyone just diminishing their responsibility to feel more heard it's about you know rolling up your sleeves joining somewhere like the common ground justice project being part of the conversation you've got a real media friendly and but you know but but i had a post show to post show conversation we've had all these post shows the last one we had was it takes a village to raise a child and the question that we're asking to the audience was like what can everyone do to feel more part of their community the high streets are roding the people aren't going to church anymore the pubs are closing down we've had endless conversations about this and they probably bought their tickets online same as they brought everything else online so we don't like we don't like to confront our own responsibility for the world we're creating we have politicians we can blame we have immigrants we can blame so i what i've always loved about what james does is he he always roots things in kind of a sense of what others can do what we can do ourselves can i finish this my final question slightly pretentious question Oh God, not another one.
1:01:53So you've said - You've come to the right place. I'm really excited. I'm glad you and I can do this. Take it out, I will go pick it up. You set up narrative as something different from the short form stuff you see on social media. And what was really interesting is you were suggesting that a play is actually about agency, it's about people making choices and then having consequences. It can be about forgiveness, it can be about redemption and hope, optimism. And somehow that isn't possible in a 30-second TikTok video. And I wish you could sort of explain that a little bit. What is it about social media that doesn't quite allow us, that maybe reinforces a sense of victimhood and pessimism?
1:02:35The way we receive information now, particularly on social media, is when it's reactive, it's instant, rather than stepping back and thinking, which a play demands that you do, because you've been locked in a room and you feel ashamed about sneaking out, so you have to sit there and think about it. it's also the nature we receive information now in politics and i have great sympathy for politicians in not being able to control this is that it is relentless so the information we receive is relentless and the experience of receiving that therefore is that there is no meaning there's no meaning to the universe because it's constant whereas what a narrative does and has for 3 000 years is demand that you stop the information hitting you step back put it in a frame, quite an artificial frame, because the universe is random and mean.
1:03:23But you go, okay, well, wait, beginning, middle, and end. What started this? What did it feel like when it happened? And what do we do about it afterwards? To me, it's the equivalent of what the Sunday newspapers used to do. The chaos of the world stops. You briefly sit down for a cup of tea and go, why did we do that? Why do human beings do that? That's really weird that we do that. how can we stop doing that a narrative probably artificially maybe dangerously in a world of misinformation i would say not a narrative demands that we we seek meaning possibly where there isn't i think we need it more than ever i mean i think that's what's missing a lot of our policies is i mean i think when people say storytelling they think you mean making stuff up telling stories well they mean you don't in your former life do something yeah which actually i was i always saw it as narrative yeah that's what yeah community good communication is what you're trying to do with your you know you're telling a story about yourself that relates to a story about the country that you're trying to change in a certain way yeah yeah that's narrative exactly i've heard you talk about zap polanski trying to do that and you know other other politicians are all trying to you know spin a narrative it's just what narratives are bringing the country with us and which narratives are putting us against each other yeah yeah my My very final question, James.
1:04:39You're the busiest playwright on the planet, right? God, are you going to pitch me something? Well, you and I have been talking for several years now about the Good Friday Agreement. We have. You told me it was a perfect drama. I still believe that. So this is just a message to all the effing commissioners out there. James wants to do a play about the Good Friday Agreement. If James wants to do a play, that's enough for you lot. Just get it done. Thank you very much indeed. I wish it worked like that, but it doesn't. But thank you. And Jacob, thank you to you. I mean, we met, you badged me coming out of your play, coming out of the play.
1:05:11Do you see it as your play? No. No, you see it as James' play? No, it's our play. It's your play. It's the right. And you badged me and I could tell from that moment that you really want to change the world. I'm trying, but, you know, we can't do it alone. And I appreciate everyone that's coming with us on the journey and appreciate James and yourselves for giving me, you know, a voice. And in kind, I hope to give many other people a voice. said at the moment that's victims voices and um yeah if you want to find out more go and again check out common ground and join the conversation and you're always very generous jake about giving everyone else credit but you know even david and joan your victims would credit you for the journey that you've been on and how you're trying to use that for good i think especially in a way maybe even especially anyway thank you both for great thank you really appreciate well i found that very moving i like i mean i've known james for a long time i think he's a great guy an amazing playwright but and jake i mean he's a really impressive guy jacob it's very impressive one of the things that i felt watching the play and i want to explore this is one of the most uncomfortable moments is when jacob having been through this process of acknowledging what he's done, taken responsibility and been forgiven by the victim's mother, then goes out on the media.
1:06:29There's a media around. And he's confident and he's smiling. And there's part of you, at least in the audience, I don't know whether you felt that, that feels, how can he be kind of smiling and confident when he did this? You know, you sort of want him to be crushed and broken by it. But of course, this is a story about forgiveness. It's a story about hope. It's a story about somebody turning themselves around. It's a story about somebody who acknowledges that he still feels incredible guilt, but has also learned that that's no reason why he can't communicate clearly, look people in the eye, smile, be confident, be funny, be optimistic.
1:07:02And now have a family and kids and a life that he clearly sees as worth living. Look, I think the play is really brilliant. And when he talked about forgiveness, it was interesting as well, because my first novel, All in the Mind, the final line is about a i'll give the ending away it's about a psychiatrist who takes his own life but the final line is a man who preached forgiveness but could never forgive himself it's the very final line in the book and i kind of had a real sense of that with and i think there's something in him that can't or doesn't want to go the whole way because he is now motivated to use what he did and then all that followed particularly the forgiveness of him to make change.
1:07:50And I think he's a very, very powerful advocate. I get the sense that they both think they're slightly pushing a boulder uphill with the politics and the political debate the way that it is, but I wonder. I mean, it's an interesting question about guilt, isn't it? Because we're very much brought up to feel guilt is very bad. But in a sense, it's also a sign of some of the positive bits of Jacob's character that he feels that sense of responsibility and he wants to hold onto it. And he had an interesting point about the real litmus test being whether the guilt is so damaging that it's impeding the whole life or whether you can, as he seems to be doing, holding onto it.
1:08:26Because I think he would probably feel that if he didn't hold onto it a little bit, he would no longer be fully taking responsibility for who he used to be. I guess James, we've had a few cultural figures on leading. Anthony Gormley was It's absolutely terrific. And I love talking to people about the creative process. And we didn't really get into that with James. But what was really interesting watching James talk about it is how emotional he gets talking about something that he's been living with for years. He so gets into these characters and these themes. I think that's what makes him such a great playwright.
1:08:59My final kind of cod point is this point that when they were both at school, presumably it was uh jacob who was the larger than life charismatic school character and james he said it was figure skating or whatever and one of the problems in in modern society is that young men who may be in other contexts kind of thrive i mean if i think about a community in many parts of the world i've been in afghanistan or rural zambia or something often you do get the sense that if you're the kind of charismatic, energetic, thrill-seeking young man, you can really find a life for yourself. We've almost created a culture that favors very strongly graduates, people who do well at school, people who, and doesn't favor people like Jacob.
1:09:52And of course, what happens is when, if someone like Jacob is lucky enough to finally emerge from that, you can see all that charisma and that energy coming through which makes him almost a kind of more compelling figure than somebody who's been through a more conventional life yeah but that also says that if you get somebody like that at a younger age and have the education and have the support and have all the second chances and all that stuff then that's what was interesting it was actually quite optimistic the way he talked about his friends i mean okay some dead some jail not great but actually the most of his friends have sort of ended up sorting themselves out anyway if you haven't seen the play if it's still on you should uh and if you have i hope you've enjoyed us talking about it thank you very much
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From the publisher
Jacob Dunne killed someone as a teenager, how did he seek forgiveness from his victim’s parents? What is restorative justice? How did Jacob’s experience of the criminal justice system compel him to become a campaigner for this alternative idea of justice? How does James Graham believe drama encourages us to have the difficult conversations necessary to build a better world?
Rory and Alastair are joined by playwright James Graham and campaigner Jacob Dunne, who co-created the award-winning play The Punch which depicts Jacob’s path to restorative justice.
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Find out more about the Common Ground Justice Project at www.commongroundjustice.uk
Sign Jacob’s petition to widen victims’ access to Restorative Justice at www.RightToBeHeard.org.
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