Unisex toilets in new office - dread going into work

That's a bit extreme! Are those cubicles soundproof? But seriously, that's not likely to happen. It's more important to tackle the unpleasant (but much milder) behaviour that's already happening and to teach people (mainly men) how to behave and to respect others no matter what sex they are or where they are.

Your compny is breaking the law.

Unisex facilities are only allowed as an appropriate inclusive provision for all if each toilet is in a fully-enclosed room with floor-to-ceiling walls/doors (no gaps) and individual handwashing and drying facilities within each such room, and no means of overriding to lock from the outside. Cubicles in a communal room do not qualify, if the building only has communal cubicle rooms then these must, by law, be designated for men and women separately. This may have to be done on alternating floors of the building so levels 1 and 3 have womens and levels 2 and 4 have mens. Your manager is lying saying there's nothing to be done, insisting that the law is upheld is not an optional decision.

@SocialMol put in a written complaint to your employer and to the other company stating you want action taken or will seek legal advice. I would imagine the other company will deal with their staff prompto

This is totally illegal. What happens on the other floors? Can floors share facilities?
Your employer has a duty of care. They be on the hook for sexual harassment claims glore.

Did the OP say anything about trans people?
MN has a bee in its bonnet about shared toilets because it’s an area where women are particularly vulnerable, in a state of undress, where men (straight men that could well be known to the OP, her own colleagues will be using this toilet too) have easy access.
Fully enclosed, single occupancy unisex toilets would be great, but that isn’t what’s happening here.

Of course Big Boss man!
Get to fuck.

Drive by scolding.

(by someone who managed to not read the first post)
👏👏👏

Email the HR depts of both companies to inform them of the harassment & unacceptable behaviour. Attach the below document aswell. Copy in your senior managers and CEO, this is really unacceptable. Your firm deliberately leased a building without adequate single sex toilet provisions for its employees.

https://sex-matters.org/toilets-matter/

What a strange place you work, OP, with such a disproportionate amount of peculiar toilet behaviour.

As the arrangement bothers you, you should be informing HR that you will be working from home until they comply with the law. This requires that they provide individual fully enclosed, lockable rooms with a lavatory, washbasin and drying facilities. Those are compliant as unisex provision under the health & safety rules.

I may have misread*, but I thought Spotty Twat worked for one of the other companies that shares the building?

If that's correct, it would be difficult for OP's management to do much about it imo. It should be raised with Spotty Twat's management, obvs, but if they refused to take any action, what could OP's HR do about it?

*I'm only on my second cup of tea, so not fully functioning yet

It worse that its happening in the shared toilets where the op could easily be dragged into cubicle and raped with noone to hear her screaming or help her

No problem apology accepted.

My point stands
Cost saving is a key reason that buildings are designed and built and commissioned in a way which breaks the law.

I expect that a lot of UK insurance companies will be reviewing their policy documents to reflect the owner or occupiers obligations in this area.

They are being inappropriate because they are young men in contact with women. They don't seem to need any more reason than that.

We have to take on this entitled male behaviour in all other aspects of our working lives ( I feel sorry for the women working in that call centre) and have to take responsibility for calling it out. Do we really also have to do deal with this while at the same time taking care of our moat intimate needs ?

Can our employers not at least afford us the basic decency of a private space to take care of our intimate bodily needs in peace before we are expected to go back to police and call out inappropriate male behaviour in the workplace - (which you are right happens everywhere ) Oh wait . They do have to BY LAW.

Your question shows your basic misunderstanding of why women want single sex spaces and toilets. We don't think men behave differently in those spaces. In fact we know they behave the same elsewhere. This is not about changing their behaviour, it is about having some peace and protection from dealing with it while we feel particularly vulnerable

That is totally irrelevant to this situation.

Men who are not well known or related also attack women.

The fact that some men and women choose to live together doesn’t mean OP should have to put up with any man in what should be a single sex space.

Do you work in a bawdy 60s sitcom, OP? It would be very unusual to find a company where coincidentally so many of the men seem to have that kind of attitude, and are willing to display it at their place of work.

The MN bee in the bonnet about toilets is really bizarre. The vast majority of assaults against women aren’t by transpeople and they aren’t by strangers in bathrooms. They are by straight men who are already known to the victim.

That said, the law about unisex workplace toilets is that the cubicles have to be individual lockable rooms, so you can always raise that as an issue.

How lovely for you that you don’t mind being intimidated by pathetic men, however, some of us do. I would hope that society has moved on from women having to accept this shit, it’s the 21st century after all.

And report his sexual harrassment to your management.

I've worked in a building with unisex toilets for 18 years, but each cubicle opens onto a corridor and contains its own washbasin and sanpro bin. There's no shared area that's secluded, iyswim and I've never heard anyone griping about it.

Please provide the statistics to back that up.

And the men who do that go to work.

Read the first post again

Oddly enough the OP has the ability to control and limit the people men who have access to her toilet.

She can call the police if she encounters a random man hanging around outside her toilet.

And she could assault the "Mr Spot" with reasonable force to incapacitate him and the police would arrest him not her.

E for effort.

Your company is heading for so much trouble. 1) not complying with workplace regulations on toilet provision; 2) not acting when female staff are sexually harassed.

That's the same? Well usually it is unisex?

It is insane to me how any man or women can make sexual harassment a women’s problem.

Thats insanity.

I'd be using the disabled toilet