As senior crown prosecutor Joanne Parsons says, when people think of night shifts, they assume you’re a nurse, doctor or police officer – not a solicitor. But Joanne and her colleagues in Crown Prosecution Service Direct provide a 24-hour service that includes the Christmas holidays.
What’s your job?
I’m an out-of-hours lawyer, working evenings, weekends and bank holidays with CPS Direct, which is a 24-hour service where we give pre-charge advice to the police. We have a secondary role in producing the documents used by the police and our colleagues, so if I authorise a charge, I have to give all the reasoning and all the details.
I’ve worked in the CPS for 28 years. I joined as a graduate with no legal background and benefited from in-house training. I’ve been a qualified solicitor for 20 years. I’ve worked in a variety of roles, including complex case work, which was my dream job. But in 2010 my mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and, though I loved my job, I was spending 12 hours a day working. I had to rethink and I was given the opportunity effectively to move sideways into this role. I now work from home and it has freed up my days.
What’s been the advantage of that for you?
I’ve been able to spend that time with my mum. This year, I’ve taken the very difficult decision to move her into a care home, but it gave me two or three years when I was able to look after her at home, while continuing to work full-time.
It’s a modern thing, one of life’s new dilemmas. Middle-aged children like me having caring responsibilities for parents, while other colleagues may have other responsibilities. We have all this expertise, but it doesn’t always fit for us to work in an office, so it’s very good that the CPS offers this opportunity. Otherwise, I might have had to consider giving up work or going part-time.
What hours will you be working this Christmas?
I’ll be working a full, eight-hour shift until 10pm on Christmas Eve and then I’ll work a four-hour shift, from 5pm-9pm, on Christmas Day. We try to say that people work one year at Christmas and not the next, and we have some members of staff who don’t celebrate Christmas and are content to work on Christmas Day. Of course they will want some time off, because their children are off school.
Last year I didn’t work on Christmas Day, and it has worked out perfectly because, as I suspected at the time, that was the last year my mum knew who I was.
Christmas Day this year is perfect for me. It means I will get to go to my mum’s care home and have the day with her and then come away. I’m quite glad of that because it can be difficult and I will have that four-hour shift where I will have to focus. Through the traumas with my mum, work really helps. You have to be professional. And, to be honest, you are dealing with some people’s lives that are so wretched that it makes you think you’re not so badly off.
What’s work going to be like on Christmas Day?
In my experience, it’s a fairly busy day. Things don’t stop happening just because it’s Christmas Day. Many people don’t celebrate in a traditional way. Not everyone is sitting round a turkey.
Of course, just because people are arrested on Christmas Day, they have not necessarily committed the offence. I have to be satisfied that we have grounds for keeping someone in custody. Depriving someone of their liberty before charge is a huge responsibility.
What’s the worst thing about working at Christmas?
I work from home so I look out from my office window and see other people having a good time. It can make you feel a bit left out. I live alone and the rest of my family are the other end of the country so I can’t pop round after my shift.
And the best?
Although I work from home, my team has a good camaraderie. We have an online message system so we can chat and there’s a nice atmosphere between us all. After Christmas Day I have four days off, so on Boxing Day I will drive to Wiltshire to see my sister and family and that will be really nice.
Also, people think a Christmas alone sounds awful, but I record what I want to watch, put the tree lights on, put my feet up and sit with a glass of fizz watching Dr Who in peace.
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