Labour has criticised plans to close more public toilets in Brighton and Hove and accused the Green council administration of a lack of joined up thinking and failing to consult residents.
The party spoke out after learning that the Greens planned to put more closures before councillors at a meeting next week.
The proposal follows a council briefing about the rise in covid and flu cases in October, reminding people of the need for good hygiene.
And the council has also been encouraging “active travel” and outdoor fitness groups, all of which are year-round activities.
Yet at the same time, Labour said, the council had reduced the opening times of public toilets and failed to keep them stocked with toilet paper and soap.
Labour said: “Now we learn that the Green administration plans to close some public toilets for some of the year, or even altogether, including the Preston Park chalet toilets – with the Rotunda only to be available in the summer.
“Other closures are planned in parks and public spaces right across the city from Saltdean to Portslade.
“There has been no consultation with other councillors, stakeholders, residents or other public users of parks and public toilets.
“Labour has been making the case to keep public toilets open and called for joined up thinking with the health and wellbeing strategy, equalities and an economy based on tourism.
“The proposals will particularly disadvantage women, people with medical conditions, older people and families.
“Labour has highlighted the sheer effort that volunteers have put into outdoor fitness in the city. Five parkruns are attended by over 1,200 people even on a cold, wet weekend in the winter.
“The social element of parkruns could be lost completely because runners won’t want to hang around if there are no toilets and park cafés will lose business as a result.
“Labour understands that the Green administration plan to railroad toilet closures through to take effect on (Saturday) 1 April 2023.”
The proposal is due to be discussed by Brighton and Hove City Council’s Environment, Transport and Sustainability Committee next Tuesday (17 January).
Councillor Nancy Platts, one of Labour’s two lead members on the committee, said: “I know I speak for many residents when I express my outrage at the council’s plans to force through more public toilet closures, without consulting anybody and with no regard for public health, our park cafés or our tourist economy.
“I recognise the seriousness of the budget situation after 12 years of Tory cuts but surely there are other ways to make savings and residents should have been consulted first.
“This is a false economy that undermines the council’s own public health initiatives. The plan is ill-thought through with no alternative provision near to some of the planned closures.”
Meanwhile, let us remind everyone that the Green led council squandered £25,000 on neon lighting sculpture(?) at the Madeira Arches. Clearly vanity projects take priority over hygiene ones.
Are they closing all the toilets in the council office buildings? Oh, I forget! Their staff are working (or so we are told) from home. What a farce!
The Greens simply don’t care about residents and businesses in Brighton. They only care about their stupid dogma driven vanity projects
Local dogs have recently required expensive vet treatment after eating human poo with drugs in. Vets reported as saying they have seen an increasing number of cases. Shouldn’t we provide public toilets so that people don’t abuse public parks?
The costs of cleaning up this human poo from our parks should be considered. It does need reporting. Perhaps if these costs mount the council will reconsider just on financial grounds and provide the public facilities that a moral and decent society should give their citizens.
I wish someone woukd put the Greens and Labour down a toilet, both have proven to be useless in running the council.
One more big flush in May 2023, and all tvrds should be gone!
Sad. Basic amenities rendered unaffordable by financial mismanagement by the greens. Why do we pay council tax at all ? Desperate times. close down everything but basic amenities.
How much does it cost, really, to keep a public toilet open and clean? Many years ago, when I lived elsewhere and my elderly parents were alive, there were no public toilets anywhere, but various stores had them, so the folks would pop in occasionally, as needed. These were progressively closed down because of ‘vandalism’ and the final resort was the local McDonald’s, which did have a decently-kept and functioning loo. Obviously, my oldies never bought a burger, but at least there was somewhere to ‘go’ if they were caught short and nobody ever threw them out for not buying a burger. The message to council cretins is that going to the loo is the most basic human function and people need to have accessible and clean, well-kept facilities when they are out and about, quite probably spending money on the ‘tourist economy’, whatever that is. Or perhaps council cretins don’t ever need to ‘go’ because they are WFH.
Didn’t they decide to take toilet cleaning back under council control then found out at the Pavilion that there was a high level of crime in the vicinity? So they closed the toilets awaiting a consultation.
Maybe they should have had the consultation before they decided to take control.
Instead of the pathetic annual naked bike run, there should be a public pissoff in the centre of Brighton, preferably at the Clock Tower.
If a small town like Seaford and Lewes can manage to keep two or more public toilets open, it is ridiculous and appalling that Brighton & Hove cannot manage to do the same.
Incidentally a relation of mine died last week of prostate cancer. Until he became totally housebound he enjoyed taking a walk along the seafront, where he knew that he would be able to find a toilet when he needed one. What will happen now to others who will be in the same situation, but unable to go out anywhere for a walk in this lousy Green infected city? Maybe some of those, who are proposing this crazy, bizarre policy, will find themselves, similarly seriously affected as a result.
Such nonsense just about sums up what a dreadful council with which we are unfortunately stuck.
I am sorry for your loss.
Urinary issues affect a lot of men and women and I know that I need to be aware of the whereabouts of facilities – so for me any trip into town will include a visit to a coffee shop or Churchill Square or M&S etc. Once you get to 6pm though the options reduce dramatically and though that might not affect me in the winter, it certainly will in the summer!
As an aside, I notice that the loos at Brighton Station are now free.
Thank you Ian.
There is also one at the Jubilee Library, but with only one cubicle in the Men’s one, and when I was there yesterday, one of the urinals was not functioning. And, of course the building is closed at night.
The main one in Churchill Square has been closed for repairs for ages, and the one upstairs is very small, leading to queueing outside.
I wonder how this will affect the Pavilion Gardens cafe, which attracts people of all ages in fine weather. Not much fun for its customers or its staff. But the council could not care less about that, as longg as they can continue with their pointless vanity projects.
I cannot believe that the council has come up with this potty plan to shut 18 of our public boghouses in the city leaving just 16 open in the summer and 9 in the winter, an action that will add wee to the weeds growing in our potholes and wonky pavements. We ought to be spending more pennies refurbishing the khazis, not shutting them. This council has no sense of priorities. The only relief on the horizon is that in May we have the chance to get the losers out and reverse this crap decision. The council desperately needs to go.
Financially the council (like many others) is in pretty deep trouble.
I’d agree that this is not a desirable cut to make but what’s missing here is what Labour would cut instead.
When Labour were in power (before they lost it by booting out three of their own councillors) I seem to remember that at one point in 2020, citing COVID, they shut every single one of the city’s public conveniences.
In all this we shouldn’t lose sight of who is responsible for the running down of public services of all kinds: the Conservatives. Assisted, before 2015, by the Lib Dems.
Yet the council still has 25k to spend on some neon lights. So, there is still money. If you look through the committees there are budgets available – it’s just that the greens are choosing to prioritise spending in other areas.
If you look only at the budget for public toilets, these were cleaned by private companies. The greens decided this could be run more efficiently in-house. They were clearly wrong as the costs have been so high they have had to close many toilets down – with all the problems for human decency this causes. And lost business for city businesses and cafes where many people cannot spend hours without access to toilets. A few weeks ago I was in town, but didn’t do all the shopping that I wanted to as the public toilets were closed. I went home and ordered on-line. That harms local businesses and, in time, will lead to closures and lower business rate income. This will harm the council – but they don’t seem to have forward thinking to understand that.
Yes, there have been cuts nationally. But other councils still seem to do far better with basic services like litter collection, graffiti prevention/removal, pavement weeding, public toilets etc. One of the problems is the local councillors like to grandstand and make national political points, and not look for creative ways to deliver services for local residents. Most other councils manage it much better – we tend to be close to the bottom of most league tables comparing councils across services – so it really is a local problem.
You obviously follow this pretty closely, so will know that individual budgets are often ringfenced and based on conditional grants from central government and other grant-giving bodies. It is extremely likely that the seafront arches will come under this category, making it very unlikely that any of this money could be transferred across to help keep toilets open.
Do you honestly think that re-privatising this service would improve things? Unlikely, and Labour too were right behind bringing services back in house at one point, though that may have changed (given the fact that Labour are basically two parties, and you never quite know whether you’re getting Blair or Corbyn).
Speaking of which, and related to councillor responsiveness … seven Labour councillors are standing down before the next election, including both the present co-leaders and (I believe) two former leaders as well. This is a hell of a turnover for a party that is, on paper, in a good position to come out on top, and I have not seen it satisfactorily explained. Could it be that they know that the finances are a fair old shitshow and don’t want to be hung up to dry for making unpopular decisions such as shutting public toilets or decimating the parks budgets (which they did last time they were in)? Just a thought …
I agree that many budgets are ringfenced. But that doesn’t mean things are not possible. And as for the seafront arches, well they have been crying out for budgets. Many millions need to be spent and they are in a terrible condition. People have been fundraising to help. To think that there is 25k spare at this stage cannot be correct. It is financial stupidity whatever way you look at it. And unbelievable political naivety – green in the naive sense of the word! It just gives an easy target
I’m not suggesting re-privatisation for toilet cleaning. I doubt that anything like the same financial terms could be gained again. May be worth looking at, see if anyone would, but I doubt it. My view is that the mistake should be owned and accepted. That either extra budgets be made available to cover this, or if not possible that political responsibility is taken. This is important both for this decision and others. Neither private or public service delivery has all the answers – both have failed. But the naivety that bringing in-house would solve all problems should be called out – for we are now getting a far worse service (in many locations, no service!)
As for councillor turnover – we’ve seen that from all political parties. How many of the previous green councillors (especially their leaders) are left? I’m not surprised really – being a councillor is a difficult task. Often thankless, whatever you do is criticised. So much time dealing with council complaints and trying to get basic things delivered for people such as rubbish collection, council housing repairs, parking/road issues etc (well, the better councillors do this!). Even when we disagree with some of their views, I think we should all thank the councillors from all parties for the work they do.
Clive
They talk about cuts, yet they’ve decided to take money away from the toilet budget to help fund the vanity project at Hove lawns.
No Clive, nothing to do with budget, just a poor council who prioritise vanity over everything else.