As the 2023-24 academic year begins, we can reflect on the final outcome for 2022-23, which ended on 30 June.

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The chart shows it was generally a quiet year (see the red bars), at least once a particularly raucous October was out of the way. A total of 68 noise complaints were logged by this website, down from 117 the year before and 161 the year before that (2020-21).

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Based on those annual numbers alone, it seems that noise, as an issue, was in full-scale retreat. The truth is more complicated. The dominant feature of the chart, even now, is the extraordinary outburst of noise incidents that occurred in July and August of 2020, an anomaly sparked indirectly by the covid pandemic. As the world has slowly returned to normal, this temporary summer effect has continued to unwind. That is the biggest reason for the sharp drop in the annual numbers. (And it is still happening; July and August 2023 have been quieter than the same months in 2022, so statistics for this academic year are likely to be similarly flattered, all else equal.)

 

However, even with the advantage of falling summer complaints, it was not guaranteed that 2022-23 would be as quiet as it turned out to be. The September and October figures were troublingly large. Fortunately, a new community liaison officer at University of Bristol responded with a robust, no-nonsense approach that brought the situation under control. Incidents dwindled going into Christmas, and never really revived afterwards.

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And so, as we prepare for another trip round this circuit, can we expect a repeat performance that might—just might—finally achieve a permanent rollback in noise? Sadly not. UoB has junked last year’s successful approach by stripping the CLO of his enforcement powers. From now on, penalties will be determined by a body called the Student Resolution Service, acting on an investigation report the CLO will compile. (See article lower down this page.) Whatever benefits UoB sees in this new system, it is more bureaucratic and, one suspects, is likely ultimately to represent a less robust approach to student misbehaviour in the community.

Andrew Waller