Spending a penny is a feminist issue. The provision of public toilets in villages, towns and cities across Wales affects us all, but it affects women more than men.

These amenities, or rather the lack of them, are a class and age issue too. I appreciate that we’re all naturally a bit squeamish about talking about toilets, but it’s a bit daft given we all need them - princess or pauper; granny, toddler or teenager.

Everyone knows a toilet joke, but the truth is it’s no laughing matter.

I was horrified to hear some of the implications of public toilet closures (nearly half have shut over the past decade) - stories of older people confined to their homes, scared to go shopping for fear of being caught short - and disabled people frightened to venture to bus and train stations where toilets are shut or limited.

There are stories of some even engaging in “deliberate dehydration” to ensure they can last whilst away from home.

We ignore these stories at our peril, as it’s glaringly obvious that public conveniences play a critical role in worsening or improving mental and physical health, as well as enhancing or diminishing the social fabric of our communities.

Closing public toilets tells me a few things: that money is scarce and so non-statutory (I won’t say non-essential, as toilets clearly are) services are the first to be hit.

But it also tells us something about both the composition and priorities of the people making these decisions. Only just over a quarter of our local councillors are women for a start.

It also reveals something about our attitude towards older people. As Wales prepare for the Rugby World Cup in Japan - the country with the oldest population in the world and a quiet obsession with toilets - the Japanese could give us a valuable life lesson in respect for our elders.

Not only does its radical, “Japanese-style welfare state” embody a powerful sense of obligation towards older people, this involves both family members and society at large. Meanwhile, Haruko Arimura, minister for women’s empowerment, has even said that lavatories are so pivotal to women’s advancement that she doesn’t care if she’s known as “minister of toilets".

As with many important civic interventions, it was the Victorians who recognised the value of public toilets. Never mind the evident public health benefits, providing essential amenities in the public sphere is a mark of a civilised society where citizens care about their own welfare and respect each other’s.

But, in Victorian times, the public sphere was for men exclusively. Nineteenth century Britain was heavily gendered with the home and the domestic environment being women’s preserve, whilst the public space was for men. Therefore, like lots of things, the early public toilets were designed by men and for men. That’s important because we know that initial intent and design can prohibit attempts to make services more equal.

So we’ve inherited a model of public toilets that essentially prohibited women’s mobility, affecting how and when they left home, and for how long. This “urinary leash”, as Claudia Elphick labelled it, meant that “women could only go so far as their bladders would allow them".

The frightening thing is is still does.

The logistical issue of the time it takes for women to spend a penny is relevant too. Working in sport, I know this better than anyone.

Sports stadia used to be dreadful (I have not so fond memories of the Bob Bank at Ninian Park!); newer ones are much improved and, sometimes, it can be even quicker for us women, given the usual gender balance of spectators.

But more generally, women need more public toilets to ensure fair provision for women in queue times. The US and Canada have called for twice as many women’s as men’s in a drive for what they call “potty parity”. Meanwhile, in India, where there are fewer toilets for women than for men (and perversely, women pay more to use them), a “Right to Pee” campaign has been championed by Indian feminists.

According to the British Toilet Association!, almost a thousand public toilets have closed in the last 10 years, that’s almost half of the total.

One in five people say a lack of local toilets deters them from leaving their homes as often as they would like.

In the nicely named “Taking the P***: the decline of the great British public toilet”, published earlier this year, the Royal Society for Public Health updates that Victorian terminology calling it the “loo leash”, which extends beyond women and binds many vulnerable people and those with medical conditions to their homes.

But it’s not just the vulnerable and older people, 82% of us said public toilets didn’t meet our needs.

Addressing the neglect of this critical amenity, the RSPH’s CEO, Shirley Cramer said: “Public toilets are no luxury...(they are) basic and essential parts of the community - just like pavements and street lights.”

There have been some attempts to change this. The Public Health (Wales) Act 2017 referred to a local toilet strategy. But, from my reading, this just required our councils to have some kind of plan for what they planned to do with their public toilets, not to actually provide and maintain amenities. I guess that means full-scale closure could be a viable strategy?

In his 2018 Budget, then Chancellor Phillip Hammond ended the business rate for public toilets but that doesn’t seem to have made a massive difference.

We all know how local councils have struggled to balance the books under austerity. This makes toilets a nice to have, like libraries, leisure centres and swimming pools.

Some attempts have been made to share the load by encouraging commercial premises to open up their toilets to non-customers. However, I’m not sure this is the answer, as I know my grandmother would never have walked into a pub in Maesteg on her own to spend a penny!

I’ve heard of other councils trying to offload provision onto community councils - as if they are rolling in cash.

The problem is that no one has real responsibility for public toilets, and therefore, there is no strategy and a low levels of concern other than amongst those with the weakest voices.

Developing a toilet strategy is hardly a sexy issue or a massive priority. Yet, like lots of unsexy public policy issues for which our elected representatives have responsibility, positive interventions can make the difference between a good, healthy, sociable lifestyle and acute loneliness and depression.

So, that’s why I think toilets are a class and a feminist issue.

It’s a policy problem where the personal is very much political. After all, the decline of the public loo affects all women - younger women with periods, pregnant women, women with young children, menopausal women, disabled women, older women with bladder problems (and I’m not denying that some of these apply to men too, of course).

But we know feminism has often struggled to get traction within working class communities where some aspects of equality campaigns seem esoteric and irrelevant to the day-to-day lives of less privileged women. That’s why campaigning for public toilets strikes me as the perfect campaign for women’s organisations to champion.

I don’t believe we can allow public toilets to remain another policy dropped on already cash-strapped local authorities with no expectations for maintenance or improvement.

We could argue for proper statutory protection and decent funding.

But if you recoil from more state diktats, I’ve got another solution. How about electing more women, especially mums and carers, as well as more disabled people as our local councillors? Maybe then, the decisions taken on public toilets will better reflect our needs and priorities.

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