Recognising the transformative power of Bristol as a global civic university, we have a large number of research projects which address local and regional policy problems. Through working with our local policy partners, we co-design and work collaboratively to address local and regional challenges.
PolicyBristol is a team of experts connecting research with policymakers, ensuring that the University’s world class research base informs policy solutions.
Managing a large Research England Policy Support Fund, we nurture exciting and meaningful projects across all disciplines which address complex and interconnected policy challenges, whether they are experienced at local, regional, national, or international level. Examples include tackling net zero, renewable energy, energy security, social mobility, housing affordability, climate resilience, water security, health inequalities, the growing mental health crisis and infectious disease modelling.
Listed below are recent policy briefings which draw out research insights to underpin local and regional policy needs.
Climate change is increasingly contributing to global rises in ill health and death. Adaptation efforts are not keeping pace with the scale and speed of the challenge. Without targeted interventions, climate change will deepen existing health inequalities, as its impacts are not felt evenly.
A just transition to net zero requires policymakers and practitioners at the local level to be able to draw on a wide range of national policy instruments. This brief makes recommendations on how the policy translation process from the national to the local level can be improved.
Our research shows that everyday life has become more difficult for those who are already vulnerable to health inequalities. Residents are well-informed about how to look after their health and are highly resourceful in creating healthy habits. However, stress, cost, transport and stretched services remain barriers to health.
Decarbonization of the UK energy sector must be intensified in order to achieve current targets. One of the existing challenges to accelerate decarbonization in energy systems is a lack of enabling infrastructure, including construction and upgrades needed to produce, transport, and store clean energy in different forms. This lack of infrastructure creates delays and restrictions for connecting new renewable generation projects to the grid. Although renewable energy is affordable and widely available, the initial cost in enabling infrastructure can be prohibitive for certain customers, including community groups and vulnerable customers. These high costs leave them unable to deploy renewable energy technologies and benefit from local renewable energy production and consumption.
It is thought that trauma-informed approaches at system level can improve experiences and outcomes and prevent re-traumatisation in services for patients and staff. Many UK policies and guidelines recommend implementing such approaches across healthcare and other sectors. However, despite the concept existing since the early 2000s, the evidence base for its effectiveness and acceptability is still in development.
The University of Bristol believes that a student community which reflects our society benefits everyone, and our commitment to fair access is demonstrated by our use of contextual offers. Contextual offers have diversified our student intake by attracting and supporting those from disadvantaged and underrepresented backgrounds, and our data shows that these students go on to achieve excellent outcomes. We believe that the use of contextual data to assess the potential of future students is an effective tool to widen participation.
As part of the UK Government’s net-zero strategy, by 2025, all gas boiler installations are due to be phased out for new build properties, and phased out completely by 2035.
In the UK over three-quarters of people who die by suicide are men, with the highest rates in middle age, although the rates of suicide are growing in women.
In 2019, Bristol was the first city in the UK to publish a Voluntary Local Review (VLR) to assess local progress in meeting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The 2022 report provides updated data and information about Bristol’s progress, examines how other UK cities have approached sustainable development – especially considering recent challenges – and reflects on how national government could better partner with local governments to deliver that development.
Around one third of public sector spending goes to procure third-party goods, services, and works. Procurement rules and policies seek to ensure that contract awards are free from corruption, conflicts of interest or anticompetitive practices, and that these vast sums of public funds generate value for money and support social, environmental, and innovative practices. There is always room for improvement.
Mothers are often primarily responsible for managing the household budget on limited resources. The question of how to help low-income mothers build up financial resilience to better buffer and adapt to financial and economic shocks, has become even more urgent.
From April to July 2022, community researchers from Lawrence Hill, Bristol, led in-depth interviews with residents, and held co-analysis and co-design workshops with stakeholders, to understand the financial lives of low-income households in their community, explore barriers and enablers to financial resilience and develop solutions.
This project reviewed existing wellbeing resources and piloted counsellor-led training workshops and peer-support networks to test whether this intervention could act as a low-cost but high-gain wellbeing tool for researchers.
People in minoritized ethnic groups were hit much harder by the coronavirus pandemic than others, with higher numbers of infections and deaths from the virus and also more exposure to the negative economic consequences of the pandemic and the associated lockdown.
The toppling of the statue of Edward Colston in Bristol in June 2020 has set in motion a national debate about our heritage and who we continue to commemorate. At least 150 reviews and audits of contested heritage are taking place in the UKs towns, cities and institutions in 2020/21. Many of these have been carried out with little guidance, with actions of both removal and retention without consultation arguably contributing to social division in some places.
Autistic students commonly face mental health problems, which can be wide ranging and severe. These students face further problems in the form of stigmatising attitudes towards neurodiversity and support systems which are difficult to navigate. Identifying what works for support could help reduce the high drop-out rate for autistic students, with long term health and employment benefits.
In February 2020, Bristol launched its ambitious One City Climate Strategy, committing to becoming carbon neutral and climate resilient by 2030. The Strategy, which sets out how Bristol will respond to climate change, calls for a fair and collaborative approach based upon a just transition. A just transition, loosely defined, is a transition to a post-carbon economy that is green, sustainable, and socially inclusive, leaving no one behind in the response to climate change. Bristol is one of the first cities in the world to make an explicit promise to pursue a just transition to combat climate change.
Awareness of environmental issues, calls to action, and changing behaviour patterns are growing. 86% of Bristol citizens express concern about climate change, and concern remains high across age and ethnicity, and the city’s 34 council wards.
The use of emergency food has increased hugely in the UK in the last 5 years, with the Trussell Trust reporting a 74% increase in food parcels provided between 2015 and early 2020.
In October 2017, Mia, then aged 11, told the audience at Bristol’s Festival of the Future City: “My family don’t own a car and the bus fares are so expensive. Lots of people can’t get into Bristol to experience the city centre. Some children have never been into Bristol yet they only live a few miles away. So I want to ask you: how can children grow up and enjoy their cities if they can’t get around them? Is it fair that some children can’t do this at all?”
Achieving net-zero requires extensive economic changes in the world of work for many. As some sectors will pivot to new activities to meet the demands of the net zero transition, new jobs will emerge. Others will decline entirely as sectors (such as offshore oil and gas) are phased-down.
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