“You’re talking to Brodie here - I’m from Tasmania, a Palawa lad and I came over to Victoria with my partner to start afresh,” the voice booms, like any other, on talk-back radio.
Except, in this case, Brodie is speaking from behind the walls of maximum-security Barwon prison in Victoria, to Beyond the Bars – a radio program that has been broadcasting every year during NAIDOC Week for the last 18 years.
Brodie tells radio show host Kutcha Edwards that he makes Koorie art during his free time in the prison.
“I do a bit of painting for my daughter, and I just try and put all my emotions and thoughts into the canvas if you know what I mean,” says Brodie.
He says the coronavirus restrictions are causing him immense emotional distress, as he can’t see his children, Arila and Leroy.
Beyond the Bars has been broadcasting every year during the NAIDOC Week, for the last 18 years, bringing out the voices of incarcerated Indigenous people. Source: 3CR Community Radio
“My son is nine, and my daughter is just about to turn two next month who haven’t been able to visit due to the lockdown in Victoria. It’s devastating, you know. It really gets to me; I would love to be able to see my kids you know,” he says.
Mr Edwards has been bringing out the voices of incarcerated Indigenous people and telling their stories for nearly two decades now.
“NAIDOC week is obviously a special time for blackfullas around the country, and just because they are locked up, it isn’t right that they don’t have the right to celebrate; so it’s a special time even though they are behind bars,” he tells NITV Radio.
The 3CR radio project, Beyond the Bars, conducts a series of radio production workshops which then lead up to national NAIDOC week radio show broadcasts. Indigenous men and women get a chance to have their voices heard from inside the prison on the show, telling the listeners on the outside about important issues, such as justice for Indigenous people but also culture, family, connection to country and language. Personal and heart-wrenching stories are shared through conversations, spoken word, poetry and music.
“For the mobs inside, that is why they warm up to Beyond The Bars – they can, in a sense, voice what is going on within the confines of maximum-security prison but internally in one’s self,” says Mr Edwards.
Bad Boys podcast
Shayne Brian and Darren Carver met in prison.
“We were both in there for white-collar crimes. Darren was in there for insider trading and I was in there for ATO-related charges, and it was during the time that we struck up a friendship. We realised there were a few problems with the system as the system was very broken and we decided to do something about it,” says Mr Brian.
Neither of the two identifies himself as an Indigenous Australian.
After they got out, they started a daily podcast show where they tell interesting stories from their days in prison but also about justice issues, including Australia’s high Indigenous incarceration rate and high recidivism rate within the Indigenous community. 
“We looked at the huge amount of recidivism and the lack of education and the lack of rehabilitation truly is lacking so much, and that’s when you find that recidivism is a revolving door of people coming back into prison. So we thought what is it that we can do and what voice can we have out in public and that’s where Bad Boys was first created where we wanted to tell a story about that,” said Shayne Brian and Darren Carver.
Shayne Brian and Darren Carver started the Bad Boys Podcast after spending time in jail and becoming aware of issue of high Indigenous incarceration rate. Source: Facebook/ Bad Boys Podcast
Back on Beyond the Bars, Brody tells host Kutcha Edwards that he managed to sell his first painting, for $550 after he entered three artworks at CONFINED – a program for imprisoned men and women.
He is going to get less than half of the money now – to spend at the prison canteen etc. – and he will get the remaining when he is released.
And this time, he is determined not to get caught up in the revolving door of the prison again.
“I am sick of always falling into old habits and ending back at the same place always, you know, and end up back in prison. So I thought I would start fresh over here and I’m going to start afresh when I get out, and I’ve got some work lined up in the mines in Western Australia. So I think I’m going to give that a try.”
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