Behind the success of the Prison Radio Association is our dedicated, hardworking staff team who make the world of prison radio in England and Wales tick. Here, we get to know them and spotlight their experience of working for the Prison Radio Association.
Ollie is one of our Producers in HMP Brixton. He works with prisoners every day, helping them to present and produce the content broadcast on National Prison Radio, which is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in prison cells. Ollie equips them with skills and confidence, increasing their chances of accessing employment and education after release. Here is his story:
How long have you been working at the Prison Radio Association? What were you doing before?
I’ve worked at National Prison Radio since April 2023. Before then, I was producing the breakfast show at Magic, as well as presenting on Absolute Radio, both of which I’d done since leaving university in 2019.
What does a typical day at work look like for you?
It’s a cliché, but no day is the same when you’re working in a prison. That being said, here’s what a normal day looks like for me:
I arrive at HMP Brixton around 8am, having got on a bus at 5:30 from Oxford (madness, I know). Once I’ve gone through security (basically airport security but with fewer suitcases), I head over to the National Prison Radio studio and set up for the day. The guys we work with are let out of their cells at 8:15, so by 8:30 usually everyone is in and ready for a day of work. I, or one of the other National Prison Radio producers will then run a quick morning meeting discussing what everyone needs to do that day, then we get to work!
During the session, my time is split between two main tasks. Firstly, I’m there to help the guys with their shows, whether that’s giving them feedback on what they’ve recorded, showing them how to edit their audio or coming up with ideas for future shows. When I’m not doing that, I’m working on one of the shows I produce. Currently, these are our talk show NPR Talk, the Rock Show and Decibel, which is a dance show. So, depending on the day I might be editing a big interview for NPR Talk or preparing the music shows to send over to our presenters.
We also often have guests in the studio for interviews (recent highlights include Louis Theroux and Kathy Burke), so I might be spending some time preparing for that with whichever member of our team is going to be interviewing the guest.
The guys go back to their cells at 11:15 and don’t return until 14:15, so between those times I’m usually in meetings with potential guest/contributors, as well as carrying on with preparing my shows for that week. We then have the guys with us again until 16:45, with that session following the same pattern as the morning. Once they’re gone, I lock up the radio studio, hand in my keys and start the journey back to Oxford.
What is the best thing about working at the Prison Radio Association?
The best thing about working for the Prison Radio Association is seeing people come out of their shells and grow into not just confident radio presenters/producers, but people who are confident in themselves in all areas of life.
During my time here, I’ve worked with so many guys in HMP Brixton who came on leaps and bounds whilst working for National Prison Radio, and now they’re doing great things on the outside.
Without the confidence they gained from working for National Prison Radio, I don’t know whether they’d have undergone the same transformation.
The second best thing is getting to tell people I’m a radio producer who works in a prison. It’s an excellent icebreaker at parties.
What is something you wish everybody understood about the realities of working in prison?
There is so much I wish people were aware of, but I think that can all be fit under the general idea that prison is nothing like you see in films/TV shows. That stuff does happen, but even the most realistic, well-researched dramas take all sorts of rare events that you might not see happen for years in a prison and condense them into one series of a show. The prison environment is far more boring than Hollywood would have you believe.
On that point, most people you meet in prison – despite what the papers might tell you – are literally just normal people. We chat about the weather. We joke about each other’s football teams. I’ve seen a couple of former drug dealers bickering over the best place to hang up the tinsel in our office over Christmas. Most of these people were failed by society in some way, leading them to make one mistake that’s ended in them being sent to prison. That one mistake is often the only difference between us.
What is your favourite podcast or radio show currently?
My favourite podcast (besides all the brilliant stuff we make in the Prison Radio Association of course) is probably Off Menu. It features my favourite comedian James Acaster, and my favourite thing to do, which is stuff my face with good food, so what’s not to like?
It’s not, however, my most-listened to podcast. That honour goes to one I won’t name, as the presenter clearly puts a lot of effort into it every week, but it’s a podcast about books that I find is the perfect thing to listen to when I need a nap. I’m sure it’s not how they intended it to be listened to, but it works wonders when I’m on my commute.
What is the song that you would use to sum up your time working at the Prison Radio Association?
So many choices. ‘Life is a Highway’ by Rascal Flatts. ‘The Wheels on the Bus’ by every single person when they’re at nursery school. Any song to convey just how much time I spend going back and forth on the M40.
On a more serious note, I’ll always remember the time we had a prisoner in Brixton come over to be interviewed in the studio. He was in his sixties and missed his wife, so he requested that we play him Roberta Flack’s ‘The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face’, as it was their wedding song. When he heard it, he broke down in tears in the middle of the office. That song will always resonate with me now.
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National Prison Radio is the world’s first national radio station for people in prison. It’s available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year on in-cell TV. National Prison Radio and reaches over 80,000 people behind bars across England and Wales.
National Prison Radio was founded by the Prison Radio Association – a registered charity. Shows like NPR Talk, the Rock Show and Decibel help people to cope with life inside prison and thrive on release. If you would like to support our work, and enhance the futures of people in prison across the UK you can make a donation at prison.radio/donate.
