Rebecca Andrews grew up in a Christian home, one of three siblings and heaps of cousins. When she was young the family moved from the countryside to a large city where she spent her schooldays in a mix of surviving the classroom and dive-bombing P.E. Thankfully she fared better in the music department, and is now an experienced musician. She sings (loudly) and plays a few instruments; recently teaching herself the trumpet until a sudden increase in local “For Sale” boards persuaded her to pack it away and not become the first copper to acquire an ASBO.

Rebecca graduated from Goldsmiths’ College, London many moons ago, though she is keen to stress that she is still on the right side of forty. As a police officer she divided her service between frontline duties and the Child Protection Unit and Paedophile Unit. Without a doubt, she learnt as much about child protection from uniformed duties as from the Units, not to mention the steep learning curve of co-ordinating child protection at church, and being Mum to her two daughters.