But tell us what this particular COP is about.

Yeah, well, it's really good to hear that the other Manchester Andy, Andy Burnham, is going to COP31.

And most people are familiar with the climate cops under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change or the UNFCCC.

And we refer to it affectionately as the Hollywood cop.

But this is a cop of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification.

And it's often referred to as a land cop.

And the UNCCD is one of the three real conventions alongside climate change and biodiversity.

How relevant do you think United Nations is? I think the United

But, you know, based on your experience, having spent more than 12 years serving an IPP sentence, what do you think people who have never experienced the system most misunderstand about what it is like?

I think firstly, thank you for inviting me to be part of the conversation.

I really appreciate everybody that's continuing to highlight the plight of people serving indeterminate sentences.

But I think one of the things that is really key is that IPP prisoners as a cohort of prisoners are not really part of the early release scheme because although the government is kind of pushing a narrative, well people are pushing a narrative that is part of the early release, I think that it's a dangerous place to be because most people that are serving indeterminate sentences Firstly, they're way beyond their tariffs, some of them years beyond their tariffs, so it's not early for them at all.

I think that some of them should have been released a long time ago.

There's about a thousand or so of them who have been recalled to custody, so relatively minor things that...

Some people may not see as minor, but being late for an appointment, for example, or not appearing to be of good behavior.

What would you say on that?

i mean if it were me i would really resent that i would and after i came out of prison i might not then have reintegrated as a normal member of society now given that you're now on the board of the howard league you clearly have but was that a difficult transition

um i mean i don't know if it was a difficult transition i was quite fortunate that life was not too bad before it went off the rails and i I developed alcoholism and drug addiction and I'm quite grateful that I'm nearly 20 years clean and sober these days.

However, I know that there are lots of people who haven't been as fortunate me in that sense.

But the other thing is that I was very lucky to have an opportunity to go and work at the Ministry of Justice when I was released from prison.

And that opportunity is not unique to me.

You know, there is a government scheme that gives opportunities to people who traditionally wouldn't be given those opportunities.

So in that sense, that really did set me up.

But I mean, there but for the grace of God, in a way, there's got to be a better system of post-release management.

Why is it being organized, and what does it hope to achieve?

Well, hi, Paul.

It's, um, fantastic to be here on the Soil Matters podcast.

We're, we're really excited to be, to be speaking and talking around COP17.

So in general, COP17, under the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, which is UNCCD, that's what the acronym stands for, brings together governments, uh, scientists, NGOs, and civil society, essentially to tackle one of the most pressing glob-global challenges that we face, which is land degradation.

And land degradation and growing deserts is not a phenomenon in some far from countries.

We see it quite significantly happening within Western Europe.

And let me ask you just for some definitions, what is meant by desertification and what is meant by land degradation?

So I wanted to ask, could you give us a little like history on how it started and how do we do it now maybe? And then Kim can maybe also say us something from her experience.

Thank you.

So classical homocystinuria was first described in Ireland, actually in, in Northern Ireland, but there is a high incidence of homocystinuria in Ireland.

And probably for that reason, the place where newborn screening for homocystinuria was first introduced was in the Republic of Ireland back in nineteen seventy-one in Dublin.

And so they have been screening now for fifty-five years.

Um, and then Manchester followed a few years later.

Um, in the early days, of course, different techniques were used for newborn screening.

So I wanted to ask, uh, apart from the technical details and learning about the disorder, why is it so important to screen for homocystinuria? How can we treat it? Can we modify it?

Nice.

And it was, like, my first...

It was, like, this 20-minute short film which to this day is still the lo- the longest piece I've ever worked on.

And, and dude, I fell in love.

I mean, like, I got to do music for a, for a, for a f- like, my dream kinda had come true, and it was just everything I hoped it would be.

It was scary.

It was wonderful.

Anybody watching who's resonating with your story, give them some, uh, words, some knowledge.