Glendale's Deric Newman on bringing former prison inmates into the workforce

HortWeek Podcast

This week's guest on the Horticulture Week Podcast is Glendale head of development, estate services, Deric Newman,

The podcast was recorded shortly after the Perennial Quiz in February. HortWeek editor Matt Appleby and Deric, both on the 'Horticulture Geeks' team, discuss how they fared.

Deric talks about his role and about Glendale's current business focus as it seeks to diversify and expand its commercial offering.

He discusses the differences between private and council work in terms of client expectations and time pressure and how much competition Glendale faces in the sector.

As the firm looks to expand its commercial business (it currently accounts for 10% of Glendale's revenue) Deric talks about the challenges of staffing and attracting people into the landscape maintenance and contracting sector.

This brings him to the work Glendale is doing with His Majesty's Prison Service as part of the New Futures Network initiative "which is basically around trying to get together employers and ex-offenders in order to offer employment on release. What is known is that if a prisoner leaves prison and they have accommodation and they have employment, the chances or the likelihood of them re -offending reduces significantly.

"So it seemed fairly straightforward to us at Glendale that it was the right thing to do...It's not our place to judge these people about why they've been in prison. That's been done... They've done their time. They are now out of prison as an ex-offender and just a member of society. And if we want our society to be improved, which is sort of what Glendale's about )you know, we're about improving green spaces that we live in and enjoy) then it's right that we're doing these sorts of things for members of society.

"The other thing, commercially, what was appealing about it is that the prison population is a ready supplier of labour. Most of the people coming out find themselves in need of a job and they actually get really good experience."

He talks about his background and the formative role played by his father who set up Civic Trees in the 1960s which was part of the post-war drive to plant trees and who was an innovator who developed pioneering technology and techniques to enable trees to be moved, rather than cut down.

Deric retains a strong connection to trees to this day. He talks about his ongoing interest in tree nurseries and reveals, as all our podcast guests do, his Desert Island Plant.

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