SUSU’s Union Council today passed a policy proposal which will see the Portswood Safety Bus service cut, as VP Welfare Beckie Thomas calls for students to “take responsibility for their own wellbeing and safety on a night out”.
Despite a significant amount of public criticism for the proposal among students, a Union Councillor told the Soton Tab there was “No debate really, [and the policy] just went through”.
The ‘Student Safety Policy’, which includes provisions to secure the Highfield Safety Bus, and “maintain a safe taxi scheme with a local taxi service”, was passed in this morning’s Union Council meeting.
The policy suggests “trained support personnel” should be used in place of the Portswood Safety Bus, due to “irresponsible” nightclubs serving excessive amounts of alcohol to students then leaving them in the care of the Safety Bus.
However, nightclub owners have responded negatively to the proposal, suggesting the policy has failed to consider that “students predrink full stop”, and the change will “only encourage more students to drink unsupervised”.
At the original debate of the policy at the Union Council meeting on 19th March, Beckie Thomas suggested that allowing the Safety Bus to continue would “prop up the activities of the clubs, and she would rather we work on changing behaviour”, suggesting a belief that replacing the service with “support personnel” would curb excessive and dangerous alcohol consumption.
It was also argued that the £7000 annual running cost was not justifiable for the supposed “54 students” who use the service.
Despite this, the Union Council today also passed a capital plan allowing SUSU to spend £32,500 on a new “social break-out space”, described in the minutes as “modern, accessible and inspirational”.
Safety Bus driver Will Pearson also questioned whether “its removal is in the interests of the welfare of students”, citing his experience of the service as a “last resort for students who are otherwise unable to get home safely”, and criticising the suggestion that clubs “consider the Safety Bus when making decisions about who to allow to enter the clubs”.
Do you agree with SUSU’s plan to cut the Portswood Safety Bus? Let us know in the comments.
This is so ridiculous – I’ve worked in the local nightclubs and I can tell you it is not in our interest to keep supplying people alcohol when they’re too drunk because not only are they a nuisance for us and the other clientele, but the authorities would come down hard on us!
Students are fully responsible for their own actions, but the safety bus is such an important service to have – what if someone just loses their friends and doesn’t have enough money for a taxi home? Southampton has an above average crime rate, it just isn’t safe for students that are alone and vulnerable to be walking home late at night. £7000 is a tiny sum of money for such a valuable service!
Reply
You’re basically completely wrong. Students shouldn’t have to be responsible for our own actions, the safety bus is a necessity in some people’s lives. Southampton is a safe, caring and loving environment to go out everyone is so friendly but it is more drunk people harming themselves I’d say. If you lose your friends and don’t have money for a taxi home then it’s your problem really isn’t it.
Reply
SUSU can do one, once again.
Reply
“This services costs £7,000 to run, and was only used by 54 students”
Outright lie to deceive the people voting on this. I’ve driven 35+/night frequently.
Reply
how is this allowed to be published? It’s full-on bullshit.
Reply
Just to clarify, the “54 students” figure isn’t from us, it’s from 9b in these Union Council minutes: https://www.susu.org/representation/minutes/975“
Reply
So one if the few good things SUSU actually do to help our students out, they’ve stopped? Great one SUSU. Probably use the money saved to allow more ex-circle-jerk to attend the grad ball.
Reply
The safety bus is the only thing that SUSU have ever done which is genuinely useful. How have the union council and the sabbs got it this far wrong?
Reply
So SUSU can’t afford the £7,000 annual costs (which is a complete lie by the way) BUT CAN afford to send its Deputy Head of Commercial Development on an ALL EXPENSES PAID totally unnecessary holiday to New York for no real reason. The Union is a disgusting joke. The sabbs don’t really run the place. They are pressured into decisions by the high-level core staff who are all in their 50s and haven’t been students in thirty-odd years. All SUSU cares about is profit, never mind the students.
Reply
SUSU is deeply corrupt cash grab where major decisions are made by unaccountable staff while we are left to play act in council and the sabb office over pointless minutae as if we have any kind of real control at all.
axing a valuable service that saves students from harm on a weekly basis? who cares, we got two microwaves installed and the shop sells tampons a few pence cheaper! Yay democracy!
Reply
For what it’s worth, they have not paid for the New York trip- it was a prize for a competition which was won for the design and launch of the Bar 3 American Diner.
Reply
Was that kept hush hush or was it in the paper.Was it announced at staff conference.Was it publicised same way as union star farce.Funny it’s going round uni like breaking news.Shame on you!!!!!!!!
Reply
Surely if the Safety Bus prevents even just one student from possibly getting attacked or collapsing on their way home, not to mention all the others, then surely that’s £7000 well spent? The idea that putting students in more danger is going to make them change their behaviour is ridiculous and it’s sad to think that it might take a serious student casualty for SUSU to realise it.
Reply
Good to see VP Welfare introduce a policy which puts more students at risk. Such superb and well thought out ideas are why SUSU has so much respect from the student body.
Reply
For shame Susu! Ridiculous decision which will directly affect the safety of the student body you ‘represent’. I hope you can sleep well when someone’s safety is directly compromised by this cut.
Disgusting.
Reply
I wonder which will get a bigger backlash… This or the grad ball organisation?!
Maybe if SUSU could run a decent nightclub they’d be in a position to actually understand the needs of students at the ends of nights and what happens before, during and after them rather than what appears to be a decision made by completely out of touch and uniformed people?
Reply
Everyone on the SUSU council should be removed from the gene pool… How an earth can they remove a service tha actually HELPS students especially freshers who may not be used to drinking a lot!!!!! Makes my blood boil that they complain about the monetary side of things but then go on and spend 50k+ on washed up coke addicts for the Grad Ball. Disgrace to the University.
Reply
Not everyone on Council voted for this to go through, it was just the majority. It’s also a problem within council because a lot of policies get voted through via show of cards – ie. publically. And its not as though it can’t be anonymous as there are clickers that can count votes anonymously, so most of the time they simply aren’t used so people often feel awkward publically voting against a policy when the rest of the room can look at them.
Reply
If you haven’t got the balls to vote publicly then maybe you shouldn’t be allowed a vote….
Reply
I agree, but some people did vote against this but it wasn’t enough to make a difference.
Reply
I agree with that, I was just conveying the concerns others have raised about how undemocratic and cliquey Council is and the processes need to change.
Reply
Don’t tell me you haven’t seen Sobar/Jesters bouncers just strong-arming people that are clearly far too drunk into the safety bus though. They’re too chicken to call an ambulance and risk being investigated. Then the poor sod driving the bus has to deal with it because they can’t just kick an incoherent mess out into the street.
Reply
Yeah and the victim either way is the student, funny that.
If this is a problem, its up to our STUDENTS UNION, people we pay and elect to represent us, to put pressure on the venues to take better care of our members. Instead they’ve use it as an excuse to save a few quid.
Reply
As one of the Jesters doorman, I can correctly inform you that we do all we can for the safety of the students. I’ve personally fireman-carried people to the safety bus myself, it’s an invaluable service for the students. We’ve sometimes had to drive drunk students back to halls ourselves.
Students regularly turn up so wasted that they can barely stand, so we don’t let them in. But how are they then going to get home? We didn’t get them drunk so they aren’t our responsibility, but taxis won’t take them. Yet we still do all we can to help them.
The students in the worse states always get like that from pre-drinking and that’s not going to stop if you take away the safety bus, it merely puts them in more danger.
Reply
It means you’ll have to call an ambulance, which if someone is in such a state that they can’t walk you should probably be doing anyway.
Reply
The one time I’ve had an ambulance called for me I was coming from a SUSU event. It was actually an ex-Union Councillor who called it, and it was entirely unnecessary. I spoke to the paramedics and they were satisfied that I was fine getting a taxi. All I needed was to get home safely – an ambulance is not a taxi service! Maybe SUSU should look into the feasibility of having two safety buses running, with one taking people to hospital.
Reply
cjeam – are you aware of the national crisis of drunken people misusing 999 Ambulance service?
An establishment (Jesters/Sobar) calling an ambulance every time somebody could have been dealt with by the Safety Bus (ie not Medical Emergency) would likely be logged and reported by NHS to the local council licensing and be shut down.
Reply
So can’t afford the safety bus which I have used to put drunk freshers on so that they can get safely home from Jesters/Sobar but SUSU spent £15,000 on that stupid general election campaign which was just such a waste of money. The students should be susu’s priority and the safely bus operating in portswood is just so useful. It encourages students not to walk home alone if they can’t afford a taxi. It’s an absolute joke.
Reply
#FuckTheCuts
Reply
Used the safety bus on the way back from Grad Ball last nNight, it is such a good service. If you are worried about the cost to SUSU, increase the price! Students will still pay as it is a safer and more reliable method to get home.
Reply
This is the most stupid idea! Not being funny but the people who desperately need it- like the poor girl on my bus last night who was left by friends and didn’t know her own home, will suffer! Yes she shouldn’t have gotten into that state but the drivers are so caring and actively help students. I was only saying the other day how this was one of the best services that the uni actually offered. It’s not just for drunk people! If you get separated and can’t afford a mega taxi alone 1.50 is ideal instead of people walking home alone becuase they can’t afford it. Does welfare actually think that a drink awareness service is going to replace the safety bus?! Every other week there is a post on soton tab with someone being attacked and now this is only going to rise. The uni it’self promotes drinking by doing deals and big event nights surrounding drink so it’s a tad hypocritical to say we need to stop people drinking so much!! Cannot believe it!
Reply
https://www.susu.org/downloads/democracy/papers/9_977_1433358925.pdf
Please get your facts right Soton Tab. This is embarrassing, and simply untrue. You do realise it’s illegal to post straight out lies right?! Dear god, you’ve been so unreliable with news lately.
Reply
This is an outrageous decision, yet another decision by the union to get more money! £7000 a year is less than ONE students’ fees, the university can afford this and a lot more for their students safety! With the assault rates so high in Southampton I don’t see how this decision was allowed to pass so easily with “no debate really”! I’m glad I’m leaving this year, I’ve really enjoyed my time at uni but over the past 3 years I have learnt that the Univeristy of Southampton’s number one priority will always be profit, their students fall much, much lower on this list.
Reply
This is a SUSU decision and not a University one. In your three years here I would have thought you may have learnt the difference. However that said the cost quoted of £7k is a pretty small one to help protect the safety of students who have for one reason or another become in need of help getting home. I wonder if the uni was consulted on this decision or indeed if the local community police liaison was included in a discussion.
Reply
Students are supposed to be adults and need to take responsibility for their own actions. It’s childish to expect SUSU to be there every time you get too drunk in Jesters.
Reply
Susu *is* students… Fundamentally that’s all it’s supposed to be: us looking after ourselves. Southampton is not a safe city at night and we collectively decided it would be a good idea to have an affordable, safe way to get home after a night out. Now a handful of “representatives”, spurred on by a VP Welfare that clearly doesn’t give a shit about her job title and what it entails, have taken it away again.
Reply
Pretty sure the whole Safety Bus idea was a something that a VP Welfare set up several years ago without any kind of policy or vote, so there was nothing to protect it from just being scrapped at any time. This policy actually protects the Highfield safety bus and provides some kind of system to help students get home safely from Portswood.
Reply
The safety bus also takes people home who have been separated from friends and are alone.
With your point of view I also assume you believe someone who crashes their car and needs to go to hospital shouldn’t be picked by an ambulance because ‘they are supposed to be adults and need to take responsibility for their own actions’.
Reply
Pretty sure people don’t choose to be in a car crash…
Reply
What if someone was going within the speed limit, but the road was icy/ a dog runs in front and they crash. Are you saying that they should not have an ambulance called because they were slightly irresponsible?
Reply
Dumbest argument ever
Reply
Instead of whining about the policy on here, do something about it. If you don’t want to attend Union Council (I really don’t blame you) SUSU have now launched the ‘You Make Change’ idea (https://www.susu.org/you-make-change/) so head over to that or contact one of your reps on Union Council who can voice your opinion.
Reply
If Susu spent less money on whizz bang comms and website people and more money on providing actual services to students then we wouldn’t be in this position!
What the hell is a “You make change” idea? When idiots can vote through the closing down of a critical welfare service on some whim of the bureaucrats in the Union
Reply
i wonder how everyone who voted for this will feel the next time an article is published about a student getting sexually assaulted as she walked home alone in the dark. and the time after that. and the time after that. and the time after that.
Reply
downvote my comment all you like you council c*nt, it wont help you sleep any better at night
Reply
I would like to clarify a few points that have been made here. The policy that was passed does NOT cut the Portswood safety bus. There is no mention of that service in the resolves or mandates. Whether that is intentionally vague, it is not my place to comment. The policy only states that SUSU will be starting to have staff members at the clubs on the busier nights to help support students.
In Beckie’s proposing speech, she explicitly said that this new service was to augment the safety bus, as in the ~20 minutes the bus is on a run, there is no support available to students leaving the clubs and so this new initiative is there in addition. Beckie and SUSU’s CEO spent a night on the safety bus recently to see what usage of the service is and she spoke positively of it in the meeting. The figure of 54 students using it is from the meeting of council 3 months ago, and there was no mention of that figure in the policy that passed or in Beckie’s proposing speech.
With regard to the method of voting used, the majority of the voting representatives on council are elected by the student body and so accountable to them and a system of recording which members voted which way has been discussed at several meetings already. This would mean that all votes made by a member of council would be recorded and made publicly available. A system like this may be implemented next year, pending the outcome of the democracy review. The reason for the show of cards at today’s meeting was due to the fact there was no opposition to the policy, implying most present were in favour. Only when the issue is contentious or there is no clear majority do we tend to use the electronic voting system.
With regard to the lack of debate, Council is an open meeting and has been scheduled and visible on the SUSU website for several months. I had personally spoken to drivers of the safety bus who expressed dissatisfaction with the policy and offered to help draft an amendment that would secure the future of the Portswood service. This was not done and none of the drivers turned up to the meeting, which was well sign-posted around the union and open to any student to attend. I myself stay impartial during the meeting, a decision I made when running for the position, and so could not represent their views myself. The policy in an earlier form had also been discussed at a previous meeting by many of the members of council which may have contributed to the lack of discussion. It is not my place to speculate.
Regarding the effectiveness of council, there is to be a democracy review taking place next year to look at exactly this and ways that we can make it more representative and better reflect students’ opinions. Examples of other systems at unions around the country are being looked at and there will likely be consultation with students on these next year, as well as a series of meetings to test their respective effectiveness. For more information see the minutes of the AGM (https://www.susu.org/representation/general-meeting/2015/vote) and this policy: https://www.susu.org/downloads/democracy/papers/9_1043_1431294724.pdf
I hope this helps to clear up what happened in the meeting and answer any questions people may have. I apologise for the lengthy answer.
Reply
Apologies in advance for the length of this:
Ben, you say that no drivers turned up to the meeting. I sent an email to Beckie Thomas in advance of the meeting highlighting many of my concerns over the policy. Some of this email has been quoted by the Tab in its recent articles. I said expicitly that I may not be able to attend the council meeting because at the time of the meeting I was collecting hired vehicles to be used as extra Safety Buses for the Grad Ball. I specifically requested to Beckie that if I was unable to attend that she read out my email. I take it this did not happen.
It is disappointing that Council and the Sabs refuse to confront criticism or enter meaningful discussion with the student body which they are supposed to represent. It may be scary, but engaging more people inevitably means encountering differences of opinion. It is totally disingenuous to simply claim that Council meetings are publicised online and open to all. You know as well as I do that the vast majority of students have better things to be doing than scour the SUSU website for policy proposals. Do you really expect 23,000 students to turn up to Council meetings? The Soton Tab, for all its faults, does a much better job of engaging students and promoting debate on issues important to students than SUSU itself does. Hell, even SUTHTH has more meaningful debate than SUSU!
With regard to the policy itself, Beckie seems to be trying to argue that this policy lays out a minimum service, and explicitly protects the Highfield Bus which was otherwise liable to be cut at any time. It would have been simple to extend this protection to the Portswood Bus in the same proposal, and failure to do so implies that the intention is to scrap it. It would be nice if the Sabs were more open with the students who elected them. In the interests of openness, here’s the full email I sent to Beckie.
___________________________
Hi Beckie,
I am writing as a student and Safety Bus Driver to express my concern over your proposals for the scrapping of the Portswood Safety Bus service as part of the policy “Securing Night-time Student Safety” at the forthcoming Union Council meeting. Whilst these views are my own, I believe many of them are shared by other Safety Bus Drivers and regular students. Since I am graduating this year the proposed changes do not directly affect me in any way, so my opinion is unbiased and based purely on what I believe to be in the best interests of SUSU and the student population.
Your first point in “This Union Believes” is that “the Highfield Safety Bus is well used and provides an important welfare service”. Whilst I wholeheartedly support the continued provision of the Highfield Safety Bus, I would argue that it is well used by only a small handful of SUSU members who take advantage of it as a cheap alternative to a taxi. Indeed, it is even cheaper than a bus ticket which I think is unsustainable, and I think that to preserve the service in the long term this may need addressing. Furthermore, I disagree that the Highfield Bus is truly a welfare service. The majority of its customers are not at any particularly great welfare risk – very few are especially drunk, so the Highfield Safety Bus can only really be considered a welfare service to those using it particularly late at night – i.e. generally the bar staff, being the last to leave the Union.
Regarding the Portswood Safety Bus, I very strongly disagree that its removal is in the interests of the welfare of students. The Safety Bus is a last resort for students who are otherwise unable to get home safely from Bevois Valley. I disagree with your suggestion that the nightclubs in Bevois Valley take advantage of the Safety Bus to relinquish their duty of care to their customers. Undoubtedly the Safety Bus service may benefit them to some small degree, but I find it unlikely that they consider the Safety Bus when making decisions about who to allow to enter the clubs, or who to serve further alcohol to.
You point out that it is SUSU’s purpose to “protect our members by ensuring they are well supported to take responsibility for their own wellbeing and safety on a night out”. The Safety Bus is precisely this support. I don’t believe any student goes out at the start of the night thinking: “I’ll get really drunk tonight and it’ll be fine because the safety bus will be there”. Of course in an ideal world everyone would take responsibility for their own wellbeing, but in the real world you must accept that students will occasionally drink too much to be able to look after themselves properly, and this is for most students (fortunately or unfortunately) a part of growing up at university.
I do entirely agree with your observation that the service is insufficiently promoted at present, though if the Portswood Safety Bus is being considered as a welfare provision, rather than a cheap taxi for students, then it should not necessarily be a concern if the number of passengers it takes is small. Nevertheless, students could be assaulted or attacked regardless of whether or not they are drunk after a night out and the service should be promoted to at least ensure students are aware of the option to take the Safety Bus should they wish.
Your alternative proposal is to replace the Portswood Safety Bus with “trained support personnel”. Firstly, Safety Bus Drivers already receive basic first aid training. I would be interested to hear what further training these support personnel would receive. Ultimately, neither Safety Bus Drivers nor any other SUSU support staff will be in a position to deal with genuine medical emergencies, and in these instances the only course of action would be to call the emergency services, (and as a Safety Bus Driver I have been in such situations on several occasions). It is obviously not desirable to place unnecessary strain on the emergency services. However, thankfully it is rare that calling 999 is justified and generally drunk students can be dealt with by taking them home, ideally accompanied by a friend. By removing the Safety Bus, you are eliminating this most common recourse.
You suggest that the “trained support personnel” will ensure students “are feeling safe and can get home safely”. What will “trained support personnel” be able to do with a drunk student who can’t stand up? Carry them home? You suggest they will have “the ability to arrange for transport for vulnerable students where this is required and where no other option is available”. Quite what this means is not clear – if you are suggesting that they then call the Highfield Safety Bus, that will place great strain on the Highfield Bus. What if it is 25 minutes away in Winchester, or already has a full load of passengers? The driver will often not be able to answer their phone anyway if they are driving. The Highfield Bus would also then presumably have to finish at least an hour later on Monday – Wednesday to wait for the close of the Bevois Valley clubs to take the “trained support personnel” home. Furthermore, what are the provisions for these personnel? Are they expected to stand outside on the road in Bevois Valley in all weathers? Do they have access to a toilet? I would also suggest that they may be a potential target for abuse or assault themselves. Finally, you are claiming that the Portswood Safety Bus negates the nightclubs’ duty of care to their customers – I find it hard to see how your proposal doesn’t do so to an even greater extent.
I fail to see how this policy can be driven by a genuine belief that it would improve student welfare. I hope that if there are ulterior motives behind this change of policy that SUSU is upfront about them. I am further concerned that a decision to scrap the Portswood Safety Bus further reduces the utilisation of the SUSU minibuses in general, which is a step towards the ultimate scrapping of all Union-owned minibuses on financial grounds. This would be to the detriment of all SUSU members and particularly clubs and societies which rely on the minibuses for many activities.
I entirely agree that consideration should be given on how to best support the welfare of students on nights out as there may be improvements that can be made. However, I believe that the proposal you have put forward is poorly conceived and would be inferior to what is currently in place.
I hope I will be able to attend the Council meeting on Monday to put my opinions across, though I am picking up externally hired vehicles for SUSU in preparation for the Grad Ball. If I am not back in time to attend, I would request that you read out this letter in full at the Council meeting.
Regards,
William Pearson
Reply
There was no mention of an email sent to her in disagreement or concern, much less read out. Yet another Sabb only acting in their own interests.
Reply
I’d see if you can publish this in the Tab as an open letter to the union with your initial comment included for context. It has far more chance of initiating the response it deserves if it isn’t hidden away in a comment section.
Reply
Hey Will,
I can only apologise for your email not being read. If I had known, I would have made efforts for it to have been done so, as I did for another email that had been sent to me regarding the BDS policy. Beckie did mention that she had received concerns from drivers and tried to address them in her speech, but your email was not read.
I am not going to try to argue that council is the most engaging body. This has been accepted by SUSU and action is being taken to try to amend it next year. Hopefully, the You Make Change system will also make it easier for students to interact with policy proposals and meetings etc.
Thank you for posting your email here. It is good to continue discussion on topics like these. Given my term as chair concludes in a few weeks, I would be more than happy to help whomever draft a similar policy that protects the Portswood Safety Bus to go to the first council of next year. Unfortunately, I won’t be a student at that time, so someone else will have to champion it for me.
Reply
This is literally one of the worst things SUSU has done. Additionally they have a multimillion pound turnover every year. This money is both minimal and totally necessary. I’m fairly certain the safety bus has saved lives. Stating that students should ‘be more responsible’ is the worst bullshit I’ve heard. It’s like saying we should remove seatbelts from cars because people should drive more carefully.
Reply
re no discussion of removing the Portswood service this was obviously the expectation of the VP Welfare in a previous meeting:
Beckie Thomas noted that this Proposal had many parts. In particular, she highlighted the removal of the Portswood Safety Bus. She stated that students were responsible adults and should be able to decide how to get home – there were the options of the safe taxi scheme, and the Take A Mate campaign. She believed that the nightclubs were being irresponsible, in chucking students on to the Safety Bus and leaving them to the Union. This services costs £7,000 to run, and was only used by 54 students, whereas the Highfield services was used by considerably more.
Reply
But the safety bus is so good for freshers, surely if youre new to a town and want to go out and drink, having a nice back up that you know will get you home safely is a good thing? I mean I get that money is clearly more important here than student welfair, but it seems a little illogical. …I guess if its only 54 students or whatever anyway it doesnt matter much though.
Reply
The safety bus will always run for susu events like freshers and various balls, late cinema, superbowl etc.. Playing devil’s advocate, if students choose to go on a night out to another pub or club not connected to susu or the university why should susu subsidise their night out? Students are completely vulnerable when wasted, if you can’t trust your mates to look after you you have to watch out for yourself. Should susu provide a city wide service? It is not and cannot be a taxi service. Taxi companies would love to close it down.The drivers do an amazing job, you never get thanked for cleaning up the sick, putting people inside their accommodation and taking attitude. Yes students are and will be at risk but I don’t know where the attitude comes from that you can do whatever you like and it is somebody else’s responsibility (usually somebody you don’t know) to look after you and get you home safely?
Reply