Latest / The Speak Life Podcast / The Power of Drama: Mr Bates vs The Post Office || SLP498

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The Power of Drama: Mr Bates vs The Post Office || SLP498 · The Speak Life Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Hello, we're from Speak Life.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_02: We like to see all things through the lens of Jesus.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_02: My name is Glenn.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_02: And I am Nate.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: And we're going to talk about Mr.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_02: Bates versus the Post Office.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_02: We've already had a video talking about 10 lessons that we can learn from the post office scandal.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_02: And uh for those who are unaware of the post office scandal, how would you catch people up, Nate?
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: I would say uh that the post office uh introduced a new accounting system, a computer that was uh kind of set up in all the little post offices around the land, and uh that this was corrupt and didn't work very well, and uh the worst thing was that they they doubled down by convincing themselves that there was certainly no problem with a machine, it must have been the men and women, uh the postmasters and postmistresses who were using them that was causing uh all the problem.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: So some people's lives were utterly and I uh sort of ripped apart by this and being accused of all sorts of things, and um over the years uh various people have taken up their cause, most notably uh Mr.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: Bates, who was a postmaster in Landudno, North Wales.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_02: He was, and uh he was a stickler, and uh he never would sign the documents that said um that I I I have uh um a mismatch between cash in hand and and what the system is telling me.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, he he seems to have doggedly pursued after truth and was the founding member of the uh was it what was it called?
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_02: The uh Postmasters for Justice Alliance.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: And uh yeah, and I think I came across the story it really kind of came across my radar just two years ago, even though Horizon came in in 1999.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_02: They started prosecuting people in the noughties.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_02: Uh there was a big investigation in 2014, and lots of things came out at that stage, and uh BBC had a big documentary at that stage, but even so it was sort of simmering away, and nobody really was talking about it that much until ITV does a drama over Christmas.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_02: And now there's like a million-strong petition that says Paula Van Elles, the ex-CEO, um, must return her CBE, and the British government is making all sorts of pledges to expedite the the uh compensation that's going to be paid to these hundreds of postmasters, and um so all of a sudden it's much more of a thing because of a drama.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_02: What does that teach us?
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, I think you pointed out in your uh list of ten um ten things we can learn is the power of drama or the power of television.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um because you can hear the facts and um you can hear the news and it sort of drones on and it's all very kind of uh legal, and um I don't understand very much about the British legal system at the best of times, and so trying to work out at what stage in the legal system has this thing got to and how widespread is it, and what's the public spokesman saying about it?
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: So at that stage you you know people will have an interest and people were aware of it, but there is something about seeing these people on screen interacting uh in their home environments and you know, trying to do the best they can, which makes it more vivid and and and plunges it into your imagination, puts it before your eyes in a way that is um more compelling and more pressing and more urgent than oh, here's someone standing outside the raw courts of justice saying this is terrible.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_02: Nine hundred sub-postmasters.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_02: I don't even know what a sub postmaster I don't know what my mind is supposed to kind of picture at that point.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one of those things, I mean, this is there's lots and lots of Ted talks about this, the power of story, and we talk about it.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas you can use statistics, yeah, but as soon as you tell a story, you've got people.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's through a story that you're going to connect with people on an emotional level in a way that statistics I sort of feel abstract, and statistics suggest that a solution can be found, which is kind of statistical.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we can change the metrics on this, right?
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas as soon as you're presented with a human being, you don't think oh, how do we change the metrics?
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: How do we solve that person?
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: You think how do we comfort that person?
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: How do we you know uh ensure that they get justice that they're dealt with fairly and honourably and kindly?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um which I think again the TV show does such a brilliant job of.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: Um there's one scene in particular uh in episode one.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: Uh is it Joe Joe Hamilton.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_01: Joe Hamilton, who's based in Gloucester somewhere, Gloucestershire.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: There is a brilliant scene, and this is just great TV.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: There's a gr brilliant scene in which uh she has just put some some baked goods, some buns, not sure what.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: She's put them on a shelf because her post office is also kind of bakery cafe thing.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: And she's just chatting with a couple of the customers, and uh one of them says, Oh, as soon as you're gone, all all those will you know, or be snaffled up by us.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: So a little bit of kind of human interaction there.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then she looks across and standing kind of in the queue for the the post office is an elderly lady who's kind of looking in her bags and looking a bit flustered.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: Remember the scene?
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: So she says, Um, is everything all right, Diane?
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: She says, I've lost it.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: I can't find my my pension book, it's not here.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: I can't find and she walks over to she says, You haven't got your pension book.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Remember, I keep it in the drawer.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: Now, there are two things that I think are absolutely glorious about that.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: One is it demonstrates the ordinary human kindness and interaction that is happening around the world all the time, which has absolutely nothing to do with systems of management and institutional policy, yeah.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's just people being kind to each other.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: And the the second thing I love about it is that it it's a brilliant piece of exposition because it shows you not just Jo, she is a sub-postmistress in this particular post office, it shows so much about her character and it does that through the script in a really natural way.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: So you create a potentially completely fictional scenario, which an elderly lady cannot find her pension book.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, right?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: How are you gonna communicate that to the audience?
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you're gonna communicate to the audience by showing an old lady sort of scoving around going, I don't know where it is, I don't know where it is.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then you're gonna see Joe's Joe's looking at her, she's looking concerned, she knows her name.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then you discover that this is an a pretty standard situation, and so Jo has taken upon herself to take care of this lady's pension book because it might be lost if she has to look after herself.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: So huge amount of exposition and character and it's just brilliantly done.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what TV and film and and literature can do.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's so much of our kind of regular media is not able to produce.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_01: What's that book on screenwriting called Save the Cat?
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_02: Somebody write Save the Cat, which is about the you know, establish your hero doing an act of kindness in the first 30 seconds.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_02: We've learned, you know.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_02: And so if you can go up into this is the save the cat moment, really for for Joe.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: And then it sets up beautifully that just a few minutes later, what we're going to see is Joe in front of a computer screen, a little bit baffled by the IT, on the phone to a helpline, which is absolutely faceless, yeah, and no help whatsoever.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_02: And the the kind of the cold indifference that she's met with on that phone line is is I I hadn't thought about until until you raised the the previous scene.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_02: It's in such stark contrast, isn't it?
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_02: Like, how is Horizon and the post office dealing with Joe when Joe is dealing so humanely with Diane?
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: And you think that is a it and again, it's like this is what arguably a big theme of the the the program, uh the you know, the the story is the little guy versus the managerial system machine, you know, the technocrats, right?
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: But that scene shows you the little guy or the little woman who is doing her best to uh look after a community of people.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: And you just think, yeah, this is that's the stuff you aren't going to orchestrate from the top down.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: And it's the sort of stuff that gets gets banned by the top down because hold on, there's a real risk here that Diane is putting her financial security huge risk.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Like that, you know, like she's a vulnerable adult.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: We're very concerned about abuse, and so financial abuse is a real thing, and so what on earth does Joe think she's doing?
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, this is against policy and all this stuff.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: You think, no, actually, this is just a an one person acting in a way that is kind and protecting and compassionate towards another.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: And and and and of course, she's the one, as you say, it's a save the cat moment.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's it elevates Joe in our in our eyes to say, she's so nice, she's so kind, she's trying her best.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yeah, yeah.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_02: And then and then that scene where she you know is instructed by the helpline to just you know click that button, and the error that was like£2,000 at the time suddenly becomes£4,000.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_02: And I have been aware of this story for years and years, but I'd never felt it until that moment.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_02: And it was such a a kind of an everyman, every woman moment.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_02: Like who hasn't wrestled with IT, who hasn't dealt with a helpline that's been anything but help helpful, who hasn't like made an error and and you're just you're there.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_02: You're you're you're in Joe's shoes.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_02: And I I think this is what is behind, this is why you get a million signatures on a petition.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: Because suddenly it's it's dramatized it for us.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_01: And it it's personalized it because Joe is isn't is a is a human being, and that through the power of you know, this kind of omnipresent, you know, s lens that can follow Joe anywhere and s show her most intimate reactions, we're drawn into Joe's dilemma and Joe's anxiety, so that later on when Jo does a little bit of creative accountancy.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we understand.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: Well, of course.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because if she doesn't do this, if she doesn't make this you know, it's a she shouldn't do it.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: She shouldn't do it, and she should be more like Mr.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: Bates.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: And he's really scrupulous and you know, he's not gonna you know sign off on accounts he knows aren't aren't right.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_01: But we f like the the the empathetic kind of vision of we have of Joe is is huge.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, Monica Dolan did a did a brilliant job.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_02: I think there are some standout performances.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_02: Obviously, um you know Alan Bates played by who's I'm blanking on the name.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_02: Toby Young.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_02: Toby Young.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_02: Um Toby Jones.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_02: Toby Jones.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_02: Toby Young is the uh free speech guy.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_01: He definitely maybe he I don't know.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean maybe this is one of those times when he would have got into bat against uh against people not.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_02: But yes, Toby Jones, Toby Jones, Monica Dolan and and the rest.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: Because the there are some moments as well where the writing um is just trying to process you through a whole bunch of information, and you know, like Toby Jones is outside some institution.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_02: And here we are at the Criminal Bar of Justice Institute, and uh you must be Frederick Engels.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_02: And there's there is no that that's a don't speak our marks railing against capitalism.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, and and and TV's got to do that, right?
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: You you've got to work out a way to do your exposition, you know, so that you haven't got two characters saying, So, how long have we been brothers?
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like you don't want that, you you want it to be natural.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: And and again, you know, to go back to the scene with Diane in the in the post office, can't find a pension book.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: Because presumably Diane is is struggling with you know dementia or you know, she's just becoming forgetful, that provides us with an opportunity, the audience, to hear uh a vital piece of dialogue as a character reminds another one.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's the classic thing, whenever any kind of hotshot detective arrives at the crime scene, they are always met by a kind of uh uh an officer who, as they walk under the tape and like around the flashing lights, is gonna explain everything that we've got, yeah, so that we, the audience, then pick up that information too.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's fascinating to see how are they going to communicate some detail which is going to be essential without just literally having a narrator say it or put the text on screen to say, you know, um we're now in this place.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: But but you're right, in in terms of it's it's really good TV, it's not um like awesome TV.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um there's a lot in terms of like the cinematography at times feels as though it's it's it's not letting the script do its job in some places.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: There's one moment I think when um uh Bob who's is he like he's like second sight investigator, so he's employed by the post office to go and do an investigation, and he comes to post office HQ uh to confront them about a guy called Lee Stapleton, yes, who is um what was his name?
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: What was the actor's name?
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's been in lots.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_01: He was in like two parts of the log in a packet of crisps that's what I originally remember him from.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, and there's this really intense kind of there's a great bit of dialogue, and the whole thing's just shot with two over-the-shoulder of from you know, to get each character in.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: You've got your script and your filming, and there's all sorts of reasons for that, but it feels as though they're not completely lined up.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: But um, yeah.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: Hi folks, it's Thomas Thoroughgood here, media producer at Speak Life.
• 14:58
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• 15:02
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• 15:09
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• 15:14
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• 15:20
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• 15:25
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• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, back to the podcast.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_02: There are other decisions that have to be made in order to tell a story in four episodes, and and so various real life characters are consolidated into a single character, like on screen, and whole rafts of the story have to be kind of left out.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_02: One thing that was interesting is that we we did a video about this two years ago, and we were aware that ITV were gonna make a drama, and I think you guessed at that time was was this going to be the Nick Wallace story, who was one of the journalists who was kind of breaking it.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_02: Would this be the foot-in-the-door kind of spotlight journalist who's shining a light on the evils?
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_02: And actually we we didn't get any journalists.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_02: Did that surprise you?
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we got the there was a computer weekly uh interview which which sort of introduced the kind of media interest, and then you know, you saw uh Paul and is it Vanels?
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: Vanels, not Venels.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: But um yeah, there was that she's on a radio interview at some point where you know Horizon is never discussed and um Alan Bates is kind of on the so you've got certainly there is a media angle, but certainly as as as goes who are the heroes of these well, you've got you know the hero postmaster, Mr.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: Bates, who you know is a stickler and and won't signed, um, and proves his integrity at the lowest level that his vindication might occur at the highest level.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there's a kind of like obedience in the small things thing with him, which is kind of really powerful.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um you he did we also had a hero MP, a Tory MP who was who was shown in in a positive way.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um so yeah, it wasn't it wasn't the you know journalists' hero story that we that I'd anticipated, but um yeah, certainly thinking about these hero characters who who championed the you know the rights of of the downtrodden or the overlooked or the you know mistreated.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um and yeah, I mean that's a kind of shoe-in for kind of Christian application as as you sort of showed in your um scripted video.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_02: And we didn't get Tilda Swinton as Paula Van Elles, which I thought was a missed opportunity, but you know, perhaps the price tag was a little little hefty for that.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: Now there was there was a nice bit of cinematography, I should acknowledge it where it does go well, is that the first time we saw Paula Van Elles, did you see what framing there was?
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: Was she at her desk?
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: She was at her desk, she was looking at a computer, but she was revealed in profile, which is sort of evocative of of the step.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: The queen?
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a kind of a sense of which nah I probably would have played that up a little bit more.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I would have done like a kind of match cut to a step and then just like gone to all of her.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, by the way, post office guy crashed, break through the fourth wall.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: Love the queen.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: She's like a dark evil queen, like the shadow queen of the post office.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: But just that I just thought that was an interesting one to do.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: So again, how are you gonna tell the story?
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: What are you gonna put in the script?
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_01: What do you how are you gonna communicate things?
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: And there are things that you can do which are nice with camera angles and stuff.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: And and I'm pretty sure that Mr.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: and Mrs.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: Bates, whilst they might live in a very nice little cottage, is it really as picturesque as that?
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_02: And did they all save their conversations until they were out like on top of cataridris to discuss things.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there was a there's uh there's uh some positive things about the uh about the show.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, porn of vanells, it would be really interesting to dig into there was a Giles Fraser article.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: Right, yes.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_01: Uh he I didn't read the whole thing, I just saw some, you know, I didn't read everything.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but there were just some uh captions of it uh that were shared online effectively looking at the fact that Paul Paula Vanels, because um at some stage she got ordained as a as a non-stipendium minister in the Church of Agreement that she was therefore kind of um representative of two great British establishments, if you like the local church church and the local post office, but then because she's operating at this executive level is an example, and and uh Giles Fraser's article on this did a great job, of the worst kind of managerialism and you know, technocracy that you know ends up crushing uh crushing the local because the national is the big thing.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: So And Fergus Butler Galley uh wrote about this a couple of years ago, uh, where he said the very worst thing in all this is that these effects rarely proceed from actual malice.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: That that is the rolling out of horizon and the crushing of the little guy.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_02: It doesn't proceed from malice, but rather a blind devotion to hierarchical managerialism.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um so that's that's a lesson that a lot of people are uh are learning from it.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_02: And the fact that Paula Vanels was on this sort of leadership team that was teaching leadership skills to bishops, and if you become a bishop in the Church of England, you go through this thing.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_02: And and all the people who were teaching others were like CEOs.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: Like it was it has not been a spiritual formation for the bishops, it's all been in this hierarchical managerialism, and she was even touted to be Bishop of London Bishop of London, yeah, which is like the the the number three job in the Church of England because of her experience as a CEO, turning around the post office, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: Crushing crushing the Joe Hamiltons of this world.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_02: I know.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_02: Let's make that woman a bishop, and she's never even been a vicar, she's never even like been had pastoral charge of a of a parish, and she was third in line for the job that she was she was in the top three being interviewed for for this role.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_02: That is a a real indictment of where we how we think about church that okay, we've got a deficit.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: Well, post office had a deficit post office had a plan.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_02: Let's let's bring in efficiency savings and roll it out in this hierarchical managerialism.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_02: I know, let's do the same in the Church of England, as though it's it's one more institution among many in the country.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_02: And uh yeah, that's a real indictment.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Removing people from the the ordinary lives of average parishioners or you know the further you get away from that the easier it is for you to make these sorts of uh you know, unmalicious yet.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: Benign, maybe or just sort of to say, well, okay, this is now uh this person is is a kind of statistic.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: And the scriptures never treat us in that way.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, I'm trying to think one of the occasions when people are kind of named or listed or counted.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, David numbering the mighty men or you know is like that's a kind of major problem.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um now we might want to have lists of you know, like uh checklists of things, but being known by name is quite an inc a crucial part, and knowing the voice of the shepherd, and and the shepherd knows the sheep.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so the the the personhood and the personality and the the kind of relational is so essential to what it means for us to be to be made in the image of God and to be cr to be Christian and the organization of the church seems hellbent on moving towards uh a systematic management of all you know all the the issues and and challenges that it faces.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_02: And that's only gonna become more of a pressure with technology because of course of course in 1999 you can't be filling out your forms with paper and pen anymore, can you?
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_02: You've got to bring in the new IT system and and so like technology is this this huge pressure to treat every person as a one and a naught rather than as a as a name.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: So the video that you had made about this with the list of uh top ten reasons why uh it clicked, one of them is that this is a story that resonates with people.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: It feels like a very sadly too familiar story.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: What aspects of it do you think are there that really jive with how people feel?
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_02: We we tend to like these dramas and look, there's often a courtroom drama in which somebody is all at sea and there's a big bad corporation and then suddenly somebody steps forward.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_02: One of my favourite films of all time is a little known Australian comedy called The Castle about uh uh a man whose house is about to be um uh repossessed, repossessed or um taken by the uh the airport, because they're gonna expand the airport, and it's an allegory for aboriginal land rights.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_02: And just as the white man came and stole indigenous communities sort of land for mining purposes, and they they are you know they have absolutely no hope, and they've got a terrible lawyer who does you know it's the it's the famous scene who when he gets to the the High Court in in Canberra he says, It's unconstitutional, you can't do it.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_02: And the judge says, Well, what particular part of the constitution is is this violating?
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_02: He says, It's just it's the vibe, it's it's the vibe of the constitution.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_02: So set up as this terrible, terrible lawyer, and then uh Laurie, the great QC, happens to be in the lobby and says, I will take your case for free.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: And so the advocate steps forward, right?
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: And in the name of the little guy, and on his behalf, he turns out to be the greatest advocate ever and wins the day.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like you're punching the air by the by the end of it.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, and so that's that's a kind of a comedy version of it, but there's so many dramas, and you you you think about Aaron Brockovich or something, you know, this just knocking on the door of the corporate machine that's just grinding you in the gears.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_02: And sure and we're all saying, surely there's justice.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_02: This is unjust, this is unjust.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_02: And when you get your day in court and the truth sets you free.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's like Yeah, and the idea that there is, you know, it's that Lee Stableton's character is constantly saying, you know, I d just British justice.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm gonna trust in British justice.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know why he says British at that point.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I don't think anyone actual conversation.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_02: Like surely he would just say justice.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, well, no, because he's he's a he's I mean he's he's a token northerner, isn't he?
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: So they are very down to earth and they're thinking about you know uh being from the north and um you know that this is Britain.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um This is Britain.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is where injustice should not happen.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, this is yeah.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: You should if you're honest, yeah, it should all be fine.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: And that is a level of faith in in in that the world well that the nation is just.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: And you know for a for a Christian, we want to say, have we got the faith that the cosmos is just?
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: That you know will you know will the one who's been appointed judge the world with justice?
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_01: And will you will people be vindicated?
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_01: And there's it's just something about the the simplicity of the c the courtroom drama.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it'd be fascinating to know what percentage of um of television programmes include court appearances and you know, what percentage of people ever ordinary people go to court on a day-to-day basis.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: Very, very few.
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um and yeah, so there there is a sense in which the television distorts reality because it presents you with, you know, the the remarkable, it presents you with the extreme cases, it presents you with the like properly dramatic.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: And most of life isn't that.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: So I remember the first time I went to the States, I was just convinced I would be involved in in some kind of shootout.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_01: The police would have guns, have weapons drawn at some point in the next two weeks.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: That's America.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: Because most of the time, when I'm looking at things which are showing America, it's showing something like that.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: So there is a kind of a distortion to it.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: But because the uh Mr.
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: Bates versus the post office has so much about it which is perfectly ordinary, it is so relatable because the vast majority of people, as you said, are a bit intimidated by technology, feel that you know they're just trying to get along with their thing, they're quite locally oriented.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: And here was here was a a program that that showed how people can be you know ground up by the machine.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: Skint little people.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: Calling for justice, yeah.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_02: And there's a there's a place, I forget which episode it's in, but as they go as the 555 claimants against the post office, um, Mr.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_02: Bates says to the alliance, you know, what are we after?
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_02: And somebody says, compensation?
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but more than compensation.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: Justice?
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but more than justice.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, what's at the top of the tree?
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_02: Truth.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, compensation.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, justice, but without the truth, we can't do either of those.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: That's really interesting.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_02: That's okay, we are after some kind of consolation in this life, and we need to be able to get by.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_02: And if Joe Hamilton has to remortgage the house in order to um pay off pay off the debt, yeah, she needs some money.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so yeah, we need that level, but we need more than that, we need justice.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_02: But that I was just really interested why the the writer wants to put, okay, truth at the top of the tree.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I wonder whether justice can feel impersonal to the skint little people.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: And maybe you can tear down the pool of pool of an L's of this world, and that would be just and right, and maybe there's a fair compensation that happens, and maybe the um the convictions get overturned.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_02: But there's something about truth that is is is truth why is truth top of the tree?
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_02: Is it because I I am seen personally?
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_02: I am known personally.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_01: My story is told.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: I think that might be more characterization than it is kind of, you know, the the voice of the author sort of thing.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the voice of the writer.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_01: So so Alan Bates would not sign what he knew to be not true.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: And one of the terrifying things for the you know uh the truth coming out is that the fact that you were creative with your accounting in order to avoid a worse fate starts to come out.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if it there there is a, you know, there's something about that truth which we do we do want truth, you know, but how much truth?
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know, how much do you want this investigation to reveal?
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, I I wonder whether other characters you know, if and this is arguably where it's very, very well written, that if other characters had had to stand up and give a rallying cry, they would have just stopped at justice.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: And because it's him, yeah, he says no, this is about th the truth has to come out.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, I just thought it was a curious yeah because I I had the same thought, which is like, what do you want compensation?
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, I do want money.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_01: I want justice, yeah.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_01: There's a nice abstract noun that we can leave us on.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_02: Milkshakes for everyone is what I want.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: And and also uh free parking.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: My iPhone battery is never what I wanted it to be.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah and and and that was the cast of characters did have that variety in them, and you know, arguably that they just have that variety because not all sub postmasters and mistresses are the same.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_01: But you've got Joe, who's likely to comfort um oh I forget the name character.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um Monica Dolan.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: No, the character who has been told not to Google as his wife's sort of condition or something, because she's gone through all sorts of things.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: Is it Michael?
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and she just says in the next scene, because the the doctor says, Yeah, just don't don't Google it when you get home.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: And then almost the next scene is is Joe say, like you're not gonna Google it.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: She's so down to work.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_01: She's the most sympathetic.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: And she's so relatable, yeah, and and you know, you feel comfortable with her, and she's the one bringing the plates of sandwiches, but you also you want your you want your stickler, you want your your your hero who's committed to truth.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_02: And the story to be told, because it like you can un you can think of justice as the the the writing of wrongs and the rebalancing of the scales without the story being told.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and and what's interesting is that here we have Mr.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_02: Bates versus the post office as the story that comes out.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: And there's there's something about yeah, the truth being known and people's story being told that is what we want.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_02: And and you know, as as Christians, yeah, will there be compensation for the suffering of this world?
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_02: Plenty.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, will there will there be justice?
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, yeah, there will be.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, there'll be there'll be truth, there'll be stories told, there'll be will be known.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_02: So like 1 Corinthians 13, you know, for now we see only a reflection as in a mirror, then we shall see face to face.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_02: Now I know in part, then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_02: And that that's yeah, yeah, that's that's the cry of our hearts, especially if we feel powerless, we're the skint little people, we're ground down.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_02: Or if we're a poor pull of an else and we have not covered ourselves in glory, yeah, um, and we have doubled down on our own righteousness and been exposed.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um like yeah, we we need to kind of drop the act and look bad in the presence of love, you know, is is is the opposite of what the post office tried to do.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it tried to look good in the presence of judgment.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_02: And actually where healing comes is look bad in the presence of love, and we've got a future of that when we shall know fully even as we're fully known.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: And it and there's you know, many people think, you know, I'm a I'm a Paula Finell's or I'm a Alan Bates or I'm a you know Joe.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think many people are actually Diane.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of us who are just standing in the queue at the post office and cannot find our pension book.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: And we need the support of people who know us.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_01: Who are around us, who know the truth, and uh who are part of our story.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_01: Um and that's what's so great about this this uh TV programme, not just that hopefully it will bring about um an increase of of justice, but uh that um yeah, it will remind people that to be known and to be loved.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we were made for that community of the afflicted that uh that gathers around Mr.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_02: Bates.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_02: Well, there is a local church, and not all vicars uh like Paul Lavanelles.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: There was a good vicar who stood up for Joe Hamilton in one of the episodes.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_02: So no.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_03: Good vicar! Do send that.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_03: There's that one.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: There is that one.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: Can you find any good vicars?
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_02: Well, um, so that is some of our reaction to Mr.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_02: Bates versus the post office.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_02: What's yours?
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_02: You can let us know in the comments.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_02: And uh look, if you want to do 321, this is our course that we love people to do.
• 35:58
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• 36:04
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, there are different ways of discovering life according to Jesus.
• 36:08
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• 36:14
  SPEAKER_02: But thanks so much for joining us.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_02: Bye-bye.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_02: Bye-bye.