Restructure of Bristol uni wellbeing services prompts staff unease and resignations
Illustration: Alex Dimond
At the start of the new university term, staff at the University of Bristol’s Student Wellbeing Services are faced with an uncertain future. In June, the Cable reported on a proposed restructure of the wellbeing team, which would have involved staff cuts and major changes to service provision.
Staff have now discovered that these proposals have been postponed, but their team is facing several resignations, low morale and a pervasive sense of anxiety.
“What we call teaching block one, which is coming up at the beginning of term, is really busy,” says Tom*, a student wellbeing advisor in the University of Bristol’s Student Wellbeing Service, which provides mental health support to students with issues such as stress and loneliness as well as more severe issues such as depression and suicidal ideation.
“The numbers [of students approaching the service] just spiral and the waiting list gets very long, and we’re a really reduced team,” Tom continues. “We’ve got one less deputy head of the service. We’ve got fewer managers, lots of advisors have left.”
Wellbeing staff at the university have been faced with a major restructure of their service, since proposals were tabled by managers in April.
As part of the restructure, the Wellbeing Service is set to shrink from 44 full-time equivalent staff down to 29. But new roles will be created in other teams, meaning staff numbers across the Wellbeing Service and Student Counselling and Mental Health Advisory Service, which currently total 70, will reduce by six.
In its proposal, the university claims that the wellbeing service has “drifted from its original purpose” and that structural changes are needed to make it more efficient and create a better user experience, describing the current one as “clunky and confusing”.
The university said the new system will include new specialist mental health and sexual violence liaison roles, a self-booking system for appointments with wellbeing advisors, the added ability for third parties such as staff, family or friends to raise concerns about a student, which will be reveiwed by a new duty team.
Yet wellbeing staff have consistently challenged these proposals, arguing that removing the existing wellbeing access team will lead to a reduction in the level of care available to students, and may even put vulnerable students at risk. Bristol’s wellbeing services have come under particular scrutiny after 12 of its students died by suicide between 2016 and 2018.
Wellbeing staff, supported by representatives from Unison, UCU and Unite unions, submitted a counter-proposal in May, responding to each point made by wellbeing service management. Despite being promised a collaborative consultation process, wellbeing staff feel their proposals have largely been ignored.
Then in June, staff were informed that the proposed restructure, originally scheduled for August 2024, had been pushed back to January 2025. A spokesperson for the university confirmed that “the scope of the restructure hasn’t changed”.
A wave of resignations
For wellbeing advisors determined to provide a high quality of care to students, the management’s proposal and lack of flexibility have left a bitter taste. For Sammy*, another wellbeing adviser, the fact that the university has postponed the changes until January feels “particularly gaslighty”. She argues that the consultation process was not long enough and that wellbeing staff had found “holes in every part” of the proposal. “Obviously, we strongly object and are baffled by the idea to make people redundant, to see more students and reduce wait times and all the rest of it,” she says.
Though staff were initially concerned they would face a round of redundancies, the university has confirmed that there will be no further redundancies. However, this comes after a number of staff have left the service of their own accord, demotivated by what they see as the university not taking their concerns seriously, and their jobs won’t be replaced.
Two members of staff have taken voluntary redundancy, while a further nine staff members have quit their jobs. Three members of staff were hired on 12-month fixed-term contracts – one whose contract has already ended, while the remaining two will not see their contracts renewed.
“Even the threat of redundancy was enough for people to leave,” explains Sammy. “Every couple of days you’d get an email saying, ‘Oh, you know, it was so sad to announce that so and so is leaving’”. Tom highlights that these changes have led to the wellbeing service losing around a third of its staff: “Before all of this crap started, we would have had 46 people within our service, and from that we’re down to 31.”
A representative for Unison told the Cable: “Given the strength of opposition to the restructure, which was unanimous amongst staff, and the volume of issues raised by staff who know the service best, we regret that management have chosen to go ahead with their original proposals, with only a few minor adjustments. Staff in the Student Wellbeing Service offered a range of alternative approaches but these have not to this point been taken up by management.”
Both Tom and Sammy describe an increasingly demoralised staff team. This is in part due to more rigid appointments and less autonomy over how they structure their own time, which was one of the reasons they were attracted to the job in the first place.
“It’s difficult to feel proud of what you’re doing,” says Tom. “The new model was going to be fewer staff, doing more appointments, probably more short term work, getting rid of the wellbeing access team, so no triaging. So students book in, the first person to speak to is us. And no kind of distinction between different types of risk or severity in cases.”
Pressure from management to take on extra appointments is already taking its toll. “They’re going to use this teaching block to try to work our way up to the level of service provision that they want us to be at by January… I’m already worried about how I’m going to keep up with that. It just doesn’t fit with the way that I work”, says Tom, adding: “I’m very worried about my mental health for this term and it really feels like they are gambling with our and students’ wellbeing.”
This comes in the context of a departmental culture where staff wellbeing was frequently neglected, according to Tom and Sammy. “Sometimes there’s been a bit of a culture of being pressured to work if you’re sick,” says Tom.
“We have seen the toll this restructure has taken on staff during the months of uncertainty since the beginning of the consultation and are unsurprised that some staff have left the university in such circumstances,” said the Unison representative. “As a trade union, we will be keeping in contact with members in the Student Wellbeing Service and maintaining a close eye on how the restructure affects staff workload, wellbeing and morale.”
For Sammy, there is a deeper issue at stake: a fundamental mismatch between the university’s financially-driven model of “efficiency” and what she believes are the core values that underpin a genuine model of care. “My interest is in having care that is less hierarchical, that’s easier to access, that is embedded in… community caring for each other,” she says.
Her primary concern is the restructure will lead to students not receiving the care they need. “I’m worried about the students that are going to fall through the cracks.”
A University of Bristol spokesperson said: “The mental health and wellbeing of our community is at the heart of decision making across the University. Across the sector, Bristol has one of the highest levels of investment in this area – at around £5 million a year.
”We spent six weeks actively seeking feedback during a period of consultation,” the spokesperson said. “During this time, we received a wide range of views, which we listened to very carefully, and in some cases changed our plans, as these outcomes reflect.
“Additionally, we have chosen to take a phased implementation approach, with the new staffing structure and operating model to be in place in January so that we can ensure a smooth transition.
“We recognise this has been an anxious time for some colleagues. Colleagues have been advised of the support available to them, from the staff counselling service and the employee assistance programme.”
*The names of sources have been changed to protect their anonymity
This story was funded via a crowdfunding campaign that local trade union branches and workers are contributing to. Read more from the This Better Work series.
