Introduction

This section is, to lift Bridges and White’s phrase, about ‘doing the job’ of public protection. However, in putting these chapters together we have no wish to perpetuate a view that theory and practice are poles apart and never the twain will meet. Our view is the opposite of this. We believe that practitioners can benefit from stepping outside of the relentless pressures of everyday life by considering other (and possibly alternate) views and ideas. Similarly by understanding better the way in which practitioners see and do their job, academics in turn can inform their research programmes. This section is a combination of those who do or have done the job in a personal capacity or have the responsibility to inspect work and inquire into those cases where something has gone wrong. In public protection work we have the situation whereby separate agencies with distinct and sometimes unique roles are obliged, in law, to work with each other. Yet often those discrete agencies know little of their partners in public protection, having been trained in different ways and usually having roles that are at best compatible and at worst regarded as opposed to those in other organisations. The essence of MAPPA is to ensure that these differences do not become barriers. Our hope, therefore, is that by reading this handbook, those who work in public protection agencies can not only learn more about their partners but also perhaps begin to understand the common and different issues faced by a diverse range of staff. At the same time those practitioners reading this volume might also benefit from the ideas of academics and indeed academic practitioners.