Tuesday 09-09-2025 - 08:54

 

 

 

The University announced on 23rd July that they will be changing their parking policy, previously enforced by a parking warden, Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.

 

 

The new policy, due to be implemented from week 1 of the 2025/26 academic year, sees the introduction of automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras, and 24/7 enforcement.

This new policy would severely impact our sports clubs, societies, and colleges, that rely on free movement around the campus in the evenings and weekends to perform their basic activities. There are also a number of students who rely on their car to simply participate in their club, society, or course, who will be directly affected by this policy, introducing a barrier to participation at a time when 1 in 4 students have said they feel lonely “all or most of the time”.

We are also concerned about the process by which parking change notices (PCNs) will be issued. We expect to see students caught out, especially early on in its implementation, and issued with PCNs that will be posted to the registered address of the vehicle. How many students will return home for Christmas to a pile of overdue fines, or even a court summons? What will be tolerated in an appeal? And how many students could afford these fines, especially if they couldn’t afford to pay for parking in the first place?

 

So, what are we doing about it?

You may be one of over 21,000 people who have seen our post on Instagram, kickstarting our campaign. Before posting this, I emailed the Vice Chancellor with our concerns. In this email, I urged them to:

·      return the parking charges to their original timings;
·      commit to these timings going forward for as long as the above-mentioned reasons continue to be factors, and;
·      evaluate the process by which PCNs are issued to safeguard those students who may not have access to post sent to a home address, and who are unable to cover the costs of a fine.

 

A win! But keep the champagne on ice

On the morning of Wednesday 3rd September, I received a response. The Vice Chancellor agrees with our concerns, and the policy has been amended! The keen-eyed amongst you might already have seen the updated parking policy website.

With our work, and your engagement, we have won: 3-hours at a reduced rate of £1 in the evening period of 6pm to 8am, and at weekends. Staying longer than this will incur the original costs of £2.50 on weekday evenings, and £4 for 24 hours at weekends. 

“But that’s not what you asked for” you may be thinking to yourself – I would agree.

Costs are still being passed onto students, this is still a barrier to participation. We also have no assurances on the matter of PCNs.

 

And so, the fight goes on

I have since responded to the Vice Chancellor. 

Any cost is too high for students to afford.

We will not endorse the passing of the University’s financial burdens onto students when the maximum maintenance loan is only covering half of students’ costs, and 1 in 3 students would consider leaving their course early due to financial difficulty.

I will continue to lobby the University to:
·      return the parking charges to their original timings;
·      commit to these timings going forward for as long as the above-mentioned reasons continue to be factors, and;
·      evaluate the process by which PCNs are issued to safeguard those students who may not have access to post sent to a home address, and who are unable to cover the costs of a fine.