Combination of:
http://svn.code.sf.net/p/docutils/code/trunk@8910
http://svn.code.sf.net/p/docutils/code/trunk@8909

diff --git a/test/DocutilsTestSupport.py b/test/DocutilsTestSupport.py
index 592d3f9df..e1f33aa7a 100644
--- a/test/DocutilsTestSupport.py
+++ b/test/DocutilsTestSupport.py
@@ -819,6 +819,7 @@ def exception_data(func, *args, **kwds):
     except Exception as detail:
         return (detail, detail.args,
                 '%s: %s' % (detail.__class__.__name__, detail))
+    return None, [], "No exception"
 
 
 def _format_str(*args):
diff --git a/test/test_parsers/test_rst/test_directives/test_tables.py b/test/test_parsers/test_rst/test_directives/test_tables.py
index 07be0122f..73724ed7e 100755
--- a/test/test_parsers/test_rst/test_directives/test_tables.py
+++ b/test/test_parsers/test_rst/test_directives/test_tables.py
@@ -65,6 +65,92 @@ def null_bytes():
     next(reader)
 
 null_bytes_exception = DocutilsTestSupport.exception_data(null_bytes)[0]
+# Null bytes are valid in Python 3.11+:
+if null_bytes_exception is None:
+    bad_encoding_result = """\
+<document source="test data">
+    <table>
+        <title>
+            bad encoding
+        <tgroup cols="4">
+            <colspec colwidth="25">
+            <colspec colwidth="25">
+            <colspec colwidth="25">
+            <colspec colwidth="25">
+            <tbody>
+                <row>
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            \xfe\xff"Treat"
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "Quantity"
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "Description"
+                    <entry>
+                <row>
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "Albatr\u00b0\u00df"
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            2.99
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "\u00a1Ona\x03\xc3\x03\xc4\x03\xb9\x03\xba!"
+                    <entry>
+                <row>
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "CrunchyFrog"
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            1.49
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "Ifwetooktheb\u00f6nesout
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            itwouldn\x20\x19tbe
+                <row>
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            crunchy
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            nowwouldit?"
+                    <entry>
+                    <entry>
+                <row>
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "GannetRipple"
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            1.99
+                    <entry>
+                        <paragraph>
+                            "\xbfOna\x03\xc3\x03\xc4\x03\xb9\x03\xba?"
+                    <entry>
+    <paragraph>
+        (7- and 8-bit text encoded as UTF-16 has lots of null/zero bytes.)
+"""
+else:
+    bad_encoding_result = """\
+<document source="test data">
+    <system_message level="3" line="1" source="test data" type="ERROR">
+        <paragraph>
+            Error with CSV data in "csv-table" directive:
+            %s
+        <literal_block xml:space="preserve">
+            .. csv-table:: bad encoding
+               :file: %s
+               :encoding: latin-1
+    <paragraph>
+        (7- and 8-bit text encoded as UTF-16 has lots of null/zero bytes.)
+""" % (null_bytes_exception, utf_16_csv)
+
 
 totest = {}
 
@@ -1031,19 +1117,8 @@ u"""\
 
 (7- and 8-bit text encoded as UTF-16 has lots of null/zero bytes.)
 """ % utf_16_csv,
-"""\
-<document source="test data">
-    <system_message level="3" line="1" source="test data" type="ERROR">
-        <paragraph>
-            Error with CSV data in "csv-table" directive:
-            %s
-        <literal_block xml:space="preserve">
-            .. csv-table:: bad encoding
-               :file: %s
-               :encoding: latin-1
-    <paragraph>
-        (7- and 8-bit text encoded as UTF-16 has lots of null/zero bytes.)
-""" % (null_bytes_exception, utf_16_csv)],
+bad_encoding_result
+],
 ["""\
 .. csv-table:: good encoding
    :file: %s