My first visit to a Young Offenders Institute (YOI) left me reeling. I’d been inside adult prisons before, but nothing prepared me for the heart-wrenching reality of children in that environment.
I remember my sadness at seeing a pile of familiar children’s books, including Jacqueline Wilson’s book Sleepovers, outside the cell of a boy who had to be unlocked by three prison officers wearing riot gear.
The biggest shock was that the children seemed to know each other from before they were incarcerated.
To understand why this is shocking, you need to understand what’s actually a huge success story. For the last two decades, the number of incarcerated children has fallen drastically; from almost 3,000 in 2008 to around 400 now.
There are roughly two million 15-17 year olds in England and Wales. Yet when these 400 arrive in custody and are asked to name anybody they know inside (to help minimise gang problems), many reel off a list.
Some in the sector have long suspected the only way this is possible is if many of these children came from a very small number of hyper-localised areas, but we’ve never been able to prove it. Until now.
In February, groundbreaking data was released by the Children’s Commissioner’s Office. By matching local authority data for each child in custody between 2017 and 2022 with the National Pupil Database, we could see for the first time at an aggregate level where this group went to school. The results are fascinating.
The headline findings paint a clearer picture as to how these children know each other. What jumps out is startling geographic concentration – 36 per cent of children in YOIs had attended schools in the West Midlands. And 20 per cent of all those in custody between 2017 and 2022 went to the same six schools!
It’s also striking that the most common setting for these children pre-custody was FE college (30 per cent).
So, what needs to be done?
Many children in custody are extremely challenging, but most are also hugely vulnerable. Rather than lowering our expectations of what they can achieve, we need to hugely ramp up the support we offer them to get there.
Educational attainment, specifically English and maths GCSE, is the strongest protective factor against becoming NEET, and one of the most common traits seen in prisoners is functional illiteracy and innumeracy.
Our compulsory education system ends at 18, but funding to support young people falls off a cliff at 16. Meanwhile, FE disproportionately picks up those with furthest to go: over 90 per cent of students retaking English and maths GCSEs are not in mainstream school settings.
In FE there are twice as many students who were eligible for free school meals in year 11, but many 16-17 year olds still need intensive help to engage with education.
Targeted funding for disadvantaged young people, provided to schools through pupil premium funding, needs to extend post-16. It can then be spent on, amongst other things, helping them catch up with literacy and numeracy.
I sit on the board of FE tutoring charity Get Further, and see firsthand how hugely impactful targeted interventions can be for this cohort.
Teacher pay in FE is also considerably less than in schools, making it harder to attract and retain the best staff.
Ten years ago, I contentiously suggested that schools subsidise FE colleges to help fund maths and English retakes. This isn’t feasible in the current funding climate, but the rationale is sound: we need to reallocate funds to those institutions that serve the young people who need more support to achieve academic success.
When I speak to children in YOIs about what works, they talk about highly structured education settings with high behaviour expectations and intensive pastoral care. It’s notable that only 8 per cent of children in custody came from an education setting rated outstanding by Ofsted.
Early intervention isn’t a silver bullet: some people will get great education and wonderful support but still make terrible decisions and have to be remanded in custody.
But there are too many avoidable cases of young people without the right support. We need to be more deliberate about meeting additional need with extra resource.
“You wouldn’t pass the Turing Test!” As a nerdy teenager, it was my go-to burn for sportier tormentors.
It’s doubtful they understood my reference to the test of a machine’s ability to pass itself off as human. Now, adults who wouldn’t pass the Turing Test dominate news-column inches with their evangelism for a technology that has just bluffed its way to surpassing them.
In the mid-1980s I had the game ‘Animal, Vegetable, Mineral’ on my Amstrad 464, which learned from each round you played with it.
AI was lame then, and its 2025 descendants, ChatGPT, Gemini and DeepSeek, aren’t much better. It’s not that I haven’t tried to engage, it’s just that what they produce is usually plagiarised, or wrong, or garbage quality.
But you have to know what good looks like to see that, I suppose.
Neither they nor the technology know what they don’t know
It’s one thing to waste your own time creating inane images of personalised action figures to post on Bebo, but no filter is being applied before wasting education funding that would be better spent on teachers and CPD.
Those clueless about pedagogy are advocating we hand it over to AI, because neither they nor the technology know what they don’t know.
That couldn’t be better illustrated than in the recent news of a government-funded tool to assess the quality of students’ soldering in technical qualifications with an AI app. It will save teachers “minutes”.
Let’s leave aside for a moment the inherent benefit of a teacher having an opportunity to meaningfully check a student’s progress. After all, we wouldn’t want to do anything to suggest FE teachers add a professional, human value beyond what an app can do. Otherwise, we might have to give them a pay rise.
Let’s also ignore that you don’t need AI to test soldering, you could just try running a current through it.
Instead, let’s consider all the progress made in feedback and assessment in the last two decades. In theory, the days of students seeking validation for first attempts with no self-improvement are long gone. The sheer number of dull meetings I’ve attended about green and purple pens, and self-marking, and Directed Improvement and Reflection Time (I still shudder at that acronym) would certainly make me hope so.
But rather than having a student grab a multimeter and check their soldering themselves, this app bypasses the actual learning.
Let’s be honest, circuit-boards are mass-soldered by machines anyway. In the minds of the edtech bros advocating for this AI nonsense, we’re only humouring disadvantaged students on technical courses with the dream of working in electronics until they can drive the van that delivers new, Chinese-built electronic goodies.
Real educators see something different. They see mountains of e-waste and the value that a skilled human can bring to ensuring the sustainability of technology.
They don’t begrudge a student formative feedback, although they probably expect that the student does their own diagnostic work first. And teaching how to use a multimeter is higher on their agenda than a wasteful and damaging taxpayer-funded gimmick.
As with every edtech fad, it’s students from poorer backgrounds who are inevitably the guinea pigs and who pay the price in their outcomes and experience.
I imagine AI probably can plan lessons and mark better than the least effective teachers. But the real solution is more funding for better recruitment and training.
If teaching is just about meeting a low bar, and an app beats the weakest 5 per cent of human staff to it, then pay will plateau at that percentile. What we need is for teacher pay to be set aspirationally to raise the profession to an elite.
When state-funded education ends up palmed off onto a jumped-up Tamagotchi, those with the resources to make the choice will opt to pay extra for skilled and compassionate humans. And so the disadvantage gap will widen. The AI evangelism is class war.
This is the last chance to resist. Keep planning your lessons because planning your lessons makes you a better teacher and exercises the professional creativity that is part of what makes the job brilliant.
Keep marking because it makes your students feel valued, and good lord, they need that.
Most importantly, keep remembering AI is a parlour trick that couldn’t exist without the sum of human knowledge and creativity it feeds on.
International Workers’ Day—also known as Labour Day or May Day—is a global celebration of labourers and the working classes, promoted by the international labour movement and marked each year on 1 May, or the first Monday in May in the UK.
While traditionally associated with trade unions and campaigns for better pay and safer working conditions, May Day also invites us to consider another essential worker’s right—access to lifelong learning. And in 2025, that right is increasingly under threat.
The Working Men’s College (WMC/ WM College), founded in 1854, was created in response to the same inequalities that gave rise to the first May Day marches. At a time when education was the preserve of the privileged WMC opened its doors to working people, offering access to liberal and technical education—equipping them not just to work, but to think, create and lead.
This vision is shared by many adult community education organisations and Holex members, including the WEA which has championed education for social justice and community empowerment since the early 20th century.
Together, these institutions demonstrate that adult education is not just about qualifications. It’s about opportunity, confidence, participation, and creating space for working people to reimagine their futures.
The modern struggles facing adult learners
But today, that vision is being tested.
In recent months, many sector voices have raised concerns about the erosion of adult learning opportunities in the UK. The government’s emphasis on skills for productivity—while important—often overlooks the broader value of adult education in supporting mental health, personal growth, community cohesion, and active citizenship.
Funding cuts, a squeezed adult education budget, and ongoing uncertainty around devolution have created a tough environment for adult education providers—including colleges, local authorities, and third-sector organisations. At the same time, the rising cost of living—especially in cities like London—means working people face more barriers than ever when trying to access education. Time, travel, childcare, and course costs all act as obstacles.
Without meaningful investment, thousands of adults’ risk being locked out of the opportunities that could transform their lives. This is happening at a time when over one million more older workers have moved into economic inactivity since the pandemic. In many cases, these are people who want to reskill, re-engage, or contribute differently—but lack the support and access to do so.
Adult education is a workers’ rights issue
This May Day, we should remember that the right to learn is also a workers’ right. From retraining after redundancy to accessing creative outlets that support wellbeing, adult education is a lifeline for millions.
Adult education as a driving force of social mobility and equality is key —something that The Working Men’s College has championed since its founding by social reformers like Frederick Denison Maurice and John Ruskin. Adult education helps workers stay current with new tools, systems and best practice, it gives choices over career paths and often improves self-esteem, confidence and economic independence.
We believe that adult learning should not be a luxury or afterthought—it must be a priority. One that is embedded in any genuine effort to support working people through economic change.
Standing together for the future
This May 1st, as we commemorate the struggles and triumphs of the working class, we are reminded that the right to learn—like the right to fair wages and safe working conditions—has always been central to the fight for dignity and justice. Just as May Day was born from the desire for better working conditions, today we must continue that fight by demanding greater access to adult learning opportunities for all.
At WM College, we honour the legacy of those early social reformers who understood that true empowerment comes from knowledge. Our mission remains rooted in their vision: providing accessible, inclusive, and empowering learning opportunities that enable people to adapt, thrive, and lead.
Let us remember that the fight for workers’ rights, including the right to education, is as vital today as it was on that first May Day.
The government’s spending watchdog has urged ministers to publish their plan for achieving Labour’s manifesto pledge of recruiting 6,500 additional teachers – but revealed meeting the target will not be enough to address worsening shortages in colleges.
MPs today warned that it will be “very challenging” to meet the goal as a report by the National Audit Office found the Department for Education has estimated between 8,400 and 12,400 FE teachers are needed by 2028/29 to meet the rising demographic needs and to deliver T Levels.
It comes after the new Labour government pledged last summer to recruit an additional 6,500 teachers for schools and further education colleges by the end of Parliament, or spring 2029 at the latest.
Today’s NAO report said the FE sector is the “worst affected” type of education provider by long-term recruitment pressures with 5.1 of every 100 teaching roles vacant in general FE colleges. This amounts to 2,500 empty positions in colleges as opposed to 1,500 schoolteacher vacancies.
The report found issues with DfE’s data collection of the FE workforce, the department’s minor influence in setting teacher pay and vagueness around setting the initial 6,500 recruitment target.
It recommended that the government “fully assess, balance and manage” the implications for value for money, affordability, responding to future teaching requirements and demographics, as well as providing “greater transparency” around what the 6,500 pledge means in practice for colleges.
DfE cannot explain where 6,500 figure came from
The NAO revealed that Labour could not explain how it decided on the 6,500-recruitment figure.
DfE also did not explain how the target would be split across mainstream schools, special schools and further education colleges nor did it allude how many extra teachers are expected each year in each setting.
“As such, it is not clear if, or how, this number relates to known and forecast shortages across different settings,” the report said.
Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said that meeting the government’s pledge for 6,500 more teachers will be “very challenging”.
“Even if met, it is not clear that this will be enough to fix the nationwide shortage of teachers amidst growing numbers of students,” he said.
The NAO recommended that DfE bring together a cross-sector “package of initiatives that are affordable, cost-effective, and get at the root causes of challenges”.
“Although its 2019 recruitment and retention strategy focused on schools, DfE is now thinking about these challenges from a cross-system perspective, and in relation to their relative cost and impact, to help focus its efforts. The government’s pledge to provide an additional 6,500 teachers by the end of this Parliament has added urgency to this work,” the report said.
Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “Virtually every school and college in the country is having to manage teacher shortages because of long-standing nationwide recruitment and retention problems.
“The last government failed to address this issue and it is not clear how the current government intends to achieve its pledge of recruiting 6,500 new teachers or whether this will be anywhere near enough.”
Di’Iasio added: “We’ve had no end of piecemeal policies but the overriding factors remain unresolved – pay levels are not competitive enough and workload and stress is driving teachers out of the profession.”
Recruiting 6,500 teachers ‘unlikely’ until pay gap solved
While DfE has no influence on setting pay rates in FE, it does have “some influence” over teacher salaries, such as supporting Treasury in setting funding allocations and teacher funding packages as part of wider government spending decisions, the report said.
The NAO highlighted that the difference in median salary between schools and FE teachers was around £10,000 but is further exacerbated compared with industry salaries (see below graph).
For example, engineering professionals in industry are paid over £8,000 more than an equivalent further education teacher, and IT professionals earn over £11,000 more, DfE analysis suggests.
NAO authors also examined a host of financial and non-financial incentives to encourage teachers to stay after finding “particular challenges” around retention of FE teachers early in their career.
For example, of 6,970 new teachers in 2018, only 43 per cent were still teaching after five years.
It warned that DfE cannot realistically rely on pay alone, referencing previous research from the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) that while increasing pay for all teachers could deliver the required number, “it would require an additional £4.9 billion per year by 2026/27”.
DfE told the NAO that it is “primarily considering” expanding existing financial incentives that it knows are effective to meet the 6,500 figure.
The NAO report said: “Its proposals will need to include requests to scale up existing financial initiatives to help meet the 6,500 target, alongside core funding so settings can pay the salaries of the additional teachers. It expects to agree a plan in summer 2025, a year after the pledge was announced and four years before the latest date for the end of this Parliament, the timeframe for delivering the pledge.”
David Hughes, chief executive of Association of Colleges, said achieving DfE’s estimated of between 8,400 to 12,400 more teachers by 2028/29 is “increasingly unlikely” until the pay gap is solved, hopefully at the upcoming spending review.
“Achieving that growth looks increasingly unlikely unless and until the pay gap between colleges and schools and with industry are closed,” he said. “Other activities can and do help, but in the end the pay gap becomes the biggest barrier. Without addressing that quickly, DfE will have to acknowledge that government ambitions on its missions will be severely hampered.”
Comparison of median pay between school teachers and FE teachers, source: NAO
In July 2023, DfE announced additional further education funding of £185 million for 2023-24 and £285 million for 2024-25, which the majority of colleges used for prioritising the recruitment and retention of teaching staff and giving a uniform percentage pay rise to existing teaching staff.
In the 2024 budget statement, an additional £300 million for FE for 2025-26 was announced, but the NAO was told most of the funding is needed cover the additional teaching costs associated with rising 16 to 19 student numbers, rather than used to increase salaries.
“DfE recognises that the lack of funding for further education teacher pay could put at risk its growth and opportunity missions, alongside its commitment to recruit 6,500 new teachers,” the report added.
Data and forecasting ‘lack supporting evidence’
The Department for Education told the NAO that secondary school student numbers rose from 3.2 million to 3.7 between 2015/16 and 2023/24 and are set to increase and peak in 2028.
“These numbers will subsequently impact further education, which DfE predicts will need an additional 8,400 to 12,400 teachers by 2028/29, compared with 2020/21 levels, to meet demographic pressures and deliver T Levels,” the report said.
But the NAO found that DfE does not use its further education workforce model, which is supposed identify gaps and trends in the availability of teachers, to set targets for how many teachers it needs.
The report said the FE model is more “uncertain” than the schools model and “often lack supporting evidence”.
The model assumes teacher numbers will remain constant over time, which was an assumption DfE acknowledged was “highly unlikely” to be correct but has not compared its forecast of teacher numbers with more recent data.
DfE told the NAO authors that it is reviewing its assumptions but could not provide further details, given the early stages of the work.
The NAO recommended more cross-sector data collection after it found different methodologies and differing data collection timescales between the existing annual school workforce census and further education workforce data collection.
The report added that DfE is exploring ways to monitor progress more frequently, such as quarterly updates for schools to overcome the time lag of data being published. However, it said this would not be relevant to further education.
A DfE spokesperson said: “A high-quality FE workforce is critical to delivering the skills learners need to get on in life and drive growth in our economy, and this is why we are investing significantly in FE teachers.
“Despite challenging fiscal circumstances, the Government has announced that we will be spending over £400m more on 16-19 education in the 2025-26 financial year. Early career teachers in key technical subjects are also eligible to receive up to £6,000 per year under our Targeted Retention Incentive scheme. This will support colleges to recruit and retain the skilled teachers they need and drive our Plan for Change.”
“Colleges are responsible for managing their own budgets, including setting staff pay.”
Nineteen talented apprentices and students from across the UK will travel to Denmark this September to compete in their trades against Europe’s best at the EuroSkills competition.
The group, who are specialising in skills such as cabinetmaking, joinery, and hairdressing will go head-to-head against hundreds of their European peers in Herning from September 9 to 13.
The competition will bring together 600 young professionals to compete in 38 skills.
John Doherty, Euroskills 2025 competitor in mechatronics
In the lead up to the event, the team members, who have already undergone months of intense training, will ramp up their intensive training programme with pressure tests to push their capability to compete under pressure.
EuroSkills is the largest competition before the next global WorldSkills, which will take place next year in Shanghai, China.
John Doherty, the Euroskills competitor in mechatronics who trains at Southern Regional College, said: “I’m buzzing about the news, it’s going to be a brilliant opportunity.”
He added: “When I first started with WorldSkills UK three years ago, I didn’t think I would get this far but I have loved the thrill of competing and am really excited about taking part in EuroSkills.”
Accrington and Rossendale College learner Shelby Fitzakerly, who is a Team UK member in the painting and decorating skill, said: “It’s absolutely amazing to be selected for Team UK. Competing in Europe will definitely help my career, I’m so excited about this opportunity.”
Ben Blackledge, chief executive WorldSkills UK said the European competition is ultimately “a test of how internationally competitive UK skills are”.
“It gives us the impetus to raise standards at home and help more young people get high quality jobs,” he said.
Shelby Fitzakerly EuroSkills 2025 competitor in painting and decorating
He added: “We are so excited to be supporting and nurturing this fantastic group of young professionals as they head for Denmark to compete.”
Skills minister Jacqui Smith said: “Congratulations to all those chosen for the EuroSkills team, it’s a fantastic achievement and a unique opportunity to showcase the strength of UK skills on the European stage.
“These young people represent the ambition and expertise being developed through our further education system, which is central to building a workforce fit for the future.
“High-quality skills are at the heart of our Plan for Change, helping to grow the economy and support people into good jobs. WorldSkills UK does vital work to raise standards and ambition across technical education.”
The Department for Education has been accused of being “short-sighted” after it axed funding for a flagship careers programme focusing on apprenticeships and T Levels.
FE Week understands a handful of DfE partner organisations and services including the CEC are expecting cuts to their overall funding this financial year.
‘Truly shocked’
The news has been met with shock and disappointment from local providers, who say the programme has boosted social mobility by ensuring thousands of young people, teachers and parents are aware of their career options outside of academia.
Sharron Robbie, chief executive officer of Devon and Cornwall Training Providers Network, an ASK provider in the south west, said: “We are truly shocked at this news – careers advice especially advice that is impartial, based on local knowledge and expertise is absolutely key to ensuring young people are able to make informed choices about their futures.”
She added that defunding ASK is “short-sighted” as it has helped give apprenticeships “parity” over other post-16 options and helped young people from deprived backgrounds into “sustainable and rewarding careers”.
The DfE recently committed £3.4 million for ASK, with £2.14 million paid last financial year and £1.27 million this year, according to grant agreements published last year.
While ASK is managed nationally by CEC, supported by Amazing Apprenticeships, it is regionally overseen by four regional prime contractors, who in turn contract delivery out to a network of local providers.
A DfE spokesperson declined to comment on funding cuts to the CEC and other organisations, arguing that figures yet to be “finalised” and the department does not comment on “speculation”.
Support still exists
The spokesperson pointed to the volunteer apprenticeship and T Level ambassador networks as alternative sources of information.
They said: “Many schools and colleges have established links with technical education providers and networks.
“There is a range of digital and in-person support available to raise awareness of apprenticeships and technical education, including through the apprenticeship and T Level ambassador networks and other local support, coordinated through the Careers and Enterprise Company’s national network of careers hubs.”
A spokesperson for CEC said: “The Careers & Enterprise Company wants to extend its sincere thanks to all providers for their work in delivering this programme and supporting young people.
“At CEC, we remain fully committed to ensuring every young person can access high-quality careers education and meaningful pathways into the world of work.
“Supporting schools and colleges in helping young people explore apprenticeships and technical education to help every young person find their best next step remains a core priority for us.”
Alex Miles, managing director of ASK provider Yorkshire Learning Providers, said it was “the wrong time” to withdraw funding given incoming apprenticeship reforms and rising youth inactivity levels.
She added: “I’ve agreed to invest some of our reserves to continue the activity because I think it’s completely wrong for social mobility that school engagement stops on a knife edge.”
Simon Ashworth, deputy CEO of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, said: “Given that the government’s stated ambition in wanting more young people to take up apprenticeships or technical education pathways, we are disappointed that the Apprenticeship Support & Knowledge (ASK) programme will not be extended and will end this summer.
“This is a programme that’s helped raise awareness of apprenticeships in schools through thousands of bespoke interventions – not just for young people, but for teachers too.”
Two south west colleges have re-opened merger talks ten years after first floating the idea of joining forces.
Governors at Devon’s Exeter College and Petroc have today said merging now would provide “additional resilience against funding reductions” and “an unmatched and nationally significant curriculum for young people”. They first explored merging in 2015.
The two colleges stressed that the merger is “voluntary” and will now enter a period of due diligence and public consultation with the aim of a final vote by both boards in November.
Combining figures both colleges’ latest finances, the merged institution could have around 17,000 learners in total and a combined income of just over £96 million.
In a statement today, the colleges said the new group would create “a regional education and skills powerhouse with the ability invest, innovate and deliver ‘the exceptional’ for Devon”.
Exeter College has been rated ‘outstanding’ in its most recent two Ofsted inspections and attracted just over 12,600 funded learners, mostly 16-18 year-olds, in academic year 2023-24. It recorded ‘good’ financial health in its latest accounts.
In its most recent inspection, Petroc was downgraded from ‘good’ to ‘requires improvement’. Its latest financial health score was also ‘requires improvement’.
Merger proposals come almost a year after Sean Mackney suddenly quit as principal of Petroc. The college has been led since then by interim principal and CEO Kurt Hintz.
Both colleges promise “business as usual” as merger talks progress.
Another large college merger is in progress in neighbouring Somerset.
Next week, a public consultation on the merger of Bridgwater and Taunton College and Strode College closes. The new group, proposed to be called University Centre Somerset College Group (UCS College Group) aims to form this August.
A healthcare and science specialist training provider has been judged ‘outstanding’ after inspectors found students “excellently prepared for their future roles”.
Birmingham-based CSR Scientific Training Limited, which trains over 450 apprentices and 28 bootcamp learners online, was upgraded to Ofsted’s top mark in a report published today.
The watchdog praised the provider’s “highly ambitious” curriculum and “skilful” work with a “large range” of employers, such as the NHS, the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, Pfizer and the police service, to “co-design curriculums that align precisely to meet local and national skills needs”.
Adult learners “quickly develop important practical skills that are in very high demand” and develop “strong and worthwhile scientific and analytical skills that prepare them excellently for their future roles”, inspectors said.
CSR is a private company established in 2007 and was formerly known as Crime Scene Resources Limited. It gained its first direct contract to deliver apprenticeships in 2017 and moved into bootcamps delivery recently.
A spokesperson for the provider said: “CSR is incredibly proud of this achievement which is a true reflection of the hard work and dedication of our team, our learners and our employer partners.”
Ofsted said CSR learners show “very high levels” of commitment to their studies and are “very ambitious for their futures and routinely achieve the highest possible grades in their qualifications”.
“Passionate” learners visit local schools to promote the benefits of studying an apprenticeship in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects, compete in the “Pipette Olympics”, as well as participate in activities to promote women into STEM.
Leaders were praised for ensuring that learners and apprentices receive “beneficial career advice that informs them well about the range of opportunities available to them after completing their studies”, with a high proportion of apprentices joining professional bodies to become more employable.
And “well-experienced” governors hold leaders and managers to account. They have been “instrumental in supporting leaders to improve the quality of curriculums that they offer”.
CSR’s spokesperson said: “The hard work does not stop here and we will continue striving to deliver high quality, employer driven programmes within the booming STEM sector where our learners can continue to demonstrate their talents and hard work.”
I didn’t know a great deal about restorative justice before 2008. I was appearing as a guest artist at the ‘Get In’ Festival in Liverpool where I met Jim Moriaty, artistic director of Te Rekau community theatre company based in New Zealand. Jim’s commitment to theatre as a tool for change has helped transform the lives of many of his country’s most vulnerable people.
The company takes young offenders and puts them through a rigorous residential programme aimed at addressing the root causes of their behaviours and attempting to repair the harms that they have caused. This programme is carried out in partnership with the New Zealand justice system as an alternative to custodial sentencing; something that notable political figures including former justice ministers David Gaulk and Rory Stewart have called for here.
Jim had brought along a young person working with the company, devising and touring a performance to communities affected by offending behaviour. It was clear this process had had a remarkable effect on them. I’ve worked in many prison, probation and youth offending settings and rarely meet someone who has, in well-fitting cliched terms, literally ‘turned his life around’.
A year later my younger brother, aged 38, was murdered in a frenzied knife attack by a 17-year-old neighbour – someone he’d shown great kindness to, in recognition of the turbulent life this boy had endured. So began an endless whirlwind of trauma, grief and despair navigating the criminal justice system.
Advised by counsel, he took a ‘manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility’ charge and five years later was knocking at the door of the parole board.
Two successful appeals later we were running out of options. After less than eight years in prison, he due for release on licence.
It had been a difficult few years. My brother’s beloved wife, adored two young sons and close friends had really struggled with the brutal and meaningless manner of his passing. I’d been the first person at the scene of the killing, and that sight will be forever in my mind. I’d never envisaged myself at a murder crime scene or in a morgue, courtroom or prison but all that was my new reality.
In my rage and pain, I had deeply disturbing dreams about the offender killing myself and my family. When my wife (DfE student support champion Polly Harrow) gently suggested we consider restorative justice, I thought she’d lost her mind. But she told me how we dehumanise and demonise through disconnection, separation and avoidance. How the threat becomes so much bigger in your imagination.
The alternative, it seemed, was to continue through a living hell.
We went through months of thorough preparation with probation; I had to work out how to address the person I’d been harbouring such violent and vengeful feelings towards. Then there we were, sitting across a table from him, looking into his eyes in a ridiculously normal office with tired furniture: me, Polly, the probation team and his advocate.
Those two and a half hours literally changed my life. It was like pulling the curtain to find the Wizard of Oz was just an ordinary mortal with seemingly no ill intent. He was 24 and looked like a lost little boy.
Did he say sorry? Yes. Did he seem remorseful? Yes. Did his words help? How could they?
Were we meant to forgive, to forget, to understand? Could we?
As I spoke to him, there was a visible shift. I was beginning to feel emboldened and able to speak my mind clearly. I finally had empowered myself against this most dreaded of threats. He was finally confronting our truth and coming to terms, in the most personal and direct way, of the consequences of his murderous actions.
Our last words to him were “You owe it to us, to his children, to make something of yourself, to be the best version of yourself, to cause no more harm and to live a good life”. We left in stunned silence as we digested what had occurred. We learned afterwards that he said “I want to do better…for them.” In that moment we had become his emotionally available adults, something he had little experience of in his fractured young life. We had shown him empathy, and the whole room felt the extraordinary weight of that compassion looking into the face of a murderer.
My young nephews had suffered with severe anxiety about his release and whether he would seek them out. I was able to tell them with certainty they no longer needed to live in fear. Out of all of it, that was the most significant thing I could have said to those heartbroken children.
I could not have entered or completed this life-changing process without Polly’s unwavering support and wisdom. In our professional lives, we have both gone on to advocate for and train educators in restorative practice to reduce issues of conflict with their students and help build their abilities to heal relationships. This is something we vehemently believe in; we know that it works.
