Do we have a right to single-sex toilets?

Do you have separate toilet facilities at home for the men and women?
Or do you share with whoever is in your household?

If your workplace has decided that all the toilets are mixed sex, they need to remember that a toilet is not suitable for use by women unless it contains a sanitary waste bin.

The Govts recent response to a petition makes it clear they regard sex and gender identity as being separate protected characteristics, and that single sex facilities are still protected by The Equality Act. If women are being discriminated against in the workplace, or placed at risk, they have recourse to legal action against their employer.

So your work have said if women are not happy their toilets are now unisex they can use the already unisex ones instead? Because that’s the answer 🙄. Though I would have to start using the unisex one of it was a long way across site, just to be bloody awkward.

I could be wrong but I think there is little law on this.

Until recently there was no need as people just sorted it out sensible.

At parties in Dubai, and also in Oman, my hotels had an attendant discreetly standing by the female toilets to make sure that no men could ‘mistakenly’ enter.

Depressing that women in the middle east are shown more respect than us. Middle east isn’t usually leading the way on women’s rights.

I'm interested in this conversation. My workplace (several hundred employees) has stated that transpeople (based on self ID) can use the toilets they feel comfortable with, meaning that there are no longer any single sex toilets. They have said if women are unhappy with that, they can use unisex toilets. The provision of unisex toilets across a large site is extremely patchy and will result in a walk of several minutes, depending on where you are located.

This guidance is quite clear on the provision of separate toilets in new builds
www.gov.uk/government/news/all-public-buildings-to-have-separate-male-and-female-toilets

What is not clear to me is that it definitely applies to single sex, not gender.

It will depend on a number of factors. How many toilets in the building, how many are single sex how many unisex.

For example an old theatre with one female and one male toilet could probably justify making both unisex. If only the female toilet is made unisex this could be challenged.

However, if there were 5 male and 5 female toilets making one of each unisex and keeping 8 single sex would be proportionate. Making all 10 unisex would not be proportionate based on the fact 93% of the population identify as their biological sex. (2021 Census)