A former carer, primary school teacher and education researcher, Matt Lloyd-Rose spent a year as a Special Constable, a volunteer police officer in Lambeth, South London. On Friday evenings, he policed the borough where he lived and taught.

In this lyrical, thought-provoking and often humorous account, he captures what he saw on the streets at night - victims of crime and domestic abuse, thieves and drug-dealers, but also many people who are drunk or lost, desperate to find their way home. And characters like the illegal hot-dog seller who just won’t take no for an answer.

His work brought him into contact with specialised police units, community police officers and back-office staff. He quietly recorded the best and worst of ordinary policing from thrill-seeking adrenalin junkies, misogyny and sexism to those who showed kindness, care and patience.

He says, "this is neither a defence or the police, nor a polemic against them. Rather, it is an attempt to direct a steady gaze at some of the most complex challenges that confront us – and that includes the question of who is best suited to address them."

As Matt spends more time patrolling the night-time streets in Lambeth, he concludes that "alcohol is a superb producer of crime". The people who arrive at the bars and clubs in South London are not the same people who will leave, and some become hopelessly lost. And he concludes that wearing the uncomfortable and in some ways comic police helmet in fact serves a serious purpose.

Read by Jack Parris
Abridged and produced by Alexandra Quinn with Elizabeth Burke
A Loftus Media production for BBC Radio 4 Show less