Same place different experience. It's a statement of the obvious that two people can be in the same place having a radically different experience. To give a really extreme example imagine a hangman and a condemned man both standing on the gallows. They might occupy the same physical space but their mental space might as well be in different universes.
It's also possible to be the same person in the same place having a radically different experience. The hospital doctor being delivered to their own A&E in an ambulance. The pupil returning to their old school to take up a teaching post. I've had this experience with my 'side hustle' as a TV legal consultant returning, after a very lengthy gap, to a closed Camberwell Green Magistrates' Court when it became the set for Landscapers. Everything completely familiar and utterly strange at the same time.
Yesterday I finally passed through the gates of the last London prison in 20 years of practice that I had never visited, HMP Brixton. Going on a 'Legal' never loses the strangeness of entering the 'secure estate' but the purpose is always the same whatever the type of case might be. The taking of instructions and the giving of advice. There is generally not much time to ponder the purpose of prison itself.
But I have been in prisons for other reasons. In 2009 I saw an extraordinary production of West Side Story in HMP Wandsworth. Pimlico Opera has been putting on prison production for years now and in 2024 will be in HMP Bronzefield: https://grangeparkopera.co.uk/pimlico-opera/. More recently I judged a debate about banning smoking in prisons in HMP Pentonville between a prison team and a visiting team from the Cambridge Union (the home team won and quite deservedly so). This was organised by Vocalise which is an excellent student led initiative run by Gray's Inn, my Inn of Court, taking debating into prisons: https://www.graysinn.org.uk/education/students/career-development/vocalise/.
Artistic expression and persuasion through words are both absolutely commendable and I would suggest essential endeavours to be encouraged within prisons. But in terms of concrete and immediately employable training in skills it's hard to see anything beating The Clink Charity. My reason for visiting HMP Brixton was to have lunch at their excellent restaurant.
It was an outing organised by Dolly Theis, wife of one of my closest friends, and whose passions for rehabilitation and food policy neatly dovetailed under one roof where food is made fresh with many of the ingredients grown in the gardens of other prisons in England & Wales. I'd heard of The Clink before but what I had not realised was that its activities extend far beyond the restaurants at HMP Brixton, HMP High Down near Sutton, and HMP Styal near Manchester Airport.
The group of policy makers, journalists and other interested people I accompanied was addressed by Yvonne Thomas the recently appointed Chief Executive of the charity. She is a persuasive and engaging advocate of its virtues and activities but, as the saying goes, the proof of the pudding was in the eating and in my case that was an impressively towering strawberry baked Alaska. Preceded by a heritage tomato tart and a perfectly cooked duck breast this was serious food, properly made and attractively presented. There was no call or need for patronising platitudes.
The restaurants are dry, the cutlery is plastic and the dire warnings about trying to enter without storing your mobile phone in a locker before entry mean you can be in no doubt that you're in a restaurant with a difference. But the most important difference is that the food is being cooked and served by people who have been presented with a golden opportunity to move on from an anti-social past to find employment in the most social industry of all: hospitality. Also, leaving a restaurant with a clear head where the meat has to be cooked perfectly and where you have given and received from your dining companion undivided attention is all a plus in my book.
For a birthday party with a twist, an unforgettable date night, or a work outing with a difference it can't be beaten. Book here: https://theclinkcharity.org/
