Full Council Chaos. Bristol City Council refusing to implement single sex services

Thank you. This is the kind of pragmatic solution that works when the needs of different groups are considered - rather than the niche demands of transactivists for access to the opposite sex undressing.

As a general point it's very interesting that so many transactivists who try to dominate threads on here usually resort to rudeness, abuse and hostility when their flimsy arguments (that have been shared hundreds of times before) are dismissed by those who respect the importance of women's rights and child safeguarding and have done the research.

"We are talking policy here, not scientific fact."

Very Trumpy.

Do you normally tell people who have a different opinion to you they are not prepared to listen?

No, KTS doesn't. You can tell this yourself from the length and detail of her answers to you. The patience she shows in explaining her research is extraordinary.

I perhaps wouldn't respond to this slip into frustration by assuming she's rude - the evidence doesn't support it - but insteqad asking whether I'd missed something so self-evident that it brought that about - which I'd gently suggest the evidence does support.

You don't seem to be distinguishing very clearly between data, facts, evidence, anecdote, personal experience, policy, overview, patterns etc. yourself. Yes, they all have a complex interrelationship. Agreed, there are no absolutes (see my earlier post - there's no point in repeating this as a core part of your argument, as it's so obvious).

The question is how all these elements interrelate and the best - if imperfect - conclusions that can be drawn from them. On this, KTS's posts are hugely convincing.

I've a feeling that, if you were to come back at her with long pages of equivalent research supporting your view, she'd leap in with a degree of enthusiasm rarely seen about toilets to debate it in depth. You're not doing, though - and she's still patiently engaging regardless.

I realise the discussion prior was with regard to single sex toilets.

Single sex changing works very well at my local pool. There are signs up saying children over 8 years old need to be in the changing rooms for their sex, or in one of 2 family changing rooms if older.

These family changing rooms have their own shower and have two doors, one from the main corridor and one from a single sex changing room (one family room is next to the males, the other next to the females). There is a red and green light system outside to show when the room is occupied and it can also be locked from the inside.

These family rooms are also used by carers and those with disabilities. You might have to wait to get changed, but it's never long.

I do not think the best solution is 2 and 3, it is often/usually 1. It is going to be a different decision for each venue. I was talking from the very beginning about swimming pool changing rooms (not toilets) where it is now the norm to have unisex facilities. If you have single sex pool changing rooms, you also need a mixed sex disabled changing room because you get mothers bringing their teenage or adult disabled sons to the pool - and vice versa. You also need family changing rooms because, in single sex changing, children of 8 and above have to change in the changing room of their own sex but these days mothers bringing their 8, 9 and 10 yo sons are mostly not willing to send them alone to the male changing rooms. And the same is true in reverse. So a pool either needs one unisex changing or 4 separate changing rooms. (And please don’t tell me this is not true. I used to work in a leisure centre and when we had single sex changing, I had to deal with constant complaints about boys being in the ladies).

Ahh am multitasking so forgot to add a sentence with 2.

I will repeat the options again.

1. keep single sex toilets as single sex toilets.
2. Make all toilets the mixed sex and private design . However to fulfil building regulations these designs still have to be divided into Male and Female first. Once those numbers are satisfied, there can be unisex pictogram on the door.
3. change building regulations, legislation, British standards and HSE guidance, and possibly parts of the Sexual Offences Act so that all existing toilets are open to everyone.

Did you actually read any of what @Keeptoiletssafe wrote? She is talking scientific fact - she has repeatedly said, she collects the data, she looks at the reports, she has the numbers. Why are you so reluctant to engage with that?

eta - and policy should be based on fact, not opinion

What relevant facts do you think KeepToiletsSafe is missing?

oh I see you tagged your post to the wrong post of mine. Like I did you. I should have deleted my post or gone back to tag the correct post of yours to make it clearer.
I will do that in future.

I am really interested in opinions. It’s where I look and see if there’s common ground and concerns. There was a poster on here saying they were going to spend money on a portaloo painted in flag colours especially for trans people and allies and lots of people had a long discussion - in the end I think they realised that wouldn’t work.

Tell me your relevant facts regarding toilet design.

I am interested in your opinion still on what happens with toilet design. There’s 3 options really.

1. keep single sex toilets as single sex toilets.
2. Make all toilets mixed sex and private
3. change building regulations, legislation, British standards and HSE guidance, and possibly parts of the Sexual Offences Act so that all existing toilets are open to everyone.

Which of the facts show that the best solution for health and safety is 2 or 3?

yes any reasonable person would agree that policy should be based on facts. You can come to a different opinion with the same set of facts - hence different Chancellors will make different decisions about the economy. Or you can choose to focus on some facts and, for whatever reason, not think about other relevant facts.

Reasonable people however do not accuse other people of making stuff up when it doesn’t fit in with their opinion.

So you are agreeing I have lots of scientific facts about toilets.
I believe policy should be based on facts.

So what should policy be based on?

I’ve not made anything up. But you are entitled to disagree with me.

Do you normally tell people who have a different opinion to you they are not prepared to listen? You are entitled to your opinion but so am I. We are talking policy here, not scientific fact.

Thank you for this. I have had several parents contact me about their children who have medical conditions and how scared they are about school toilets. In an average secondary school you will have around a dozen pupils that have ambulant medical conditions where they are more prone to collapse (seizures, hypos, allergic reactions, other heart and neurological conditions).

There is a statutory duty for the school to support children with medical conditions and some of these conditions will be classed as disabilities so then there’s the reasonable adjustments to provision under the Equality Act. It needs to be challenged. It is not inclusive to the most vulnerable pupils.

I pointed out to school head teacher that only providing the design on the right (as a mixed sex facility) was a safety risk to the student I knew of who was prone to fits and collapsing and she dismissed that as a concern.

I hate the inhumanity that has been indoctrinated into some people with responsibility for the safety of the vulnerable.

Quite. I think it would be helpful if we are able to counter the frequently repeated but false claim that unisex toilets and changing are generally preferred by organisations because they are cheaper to run by some vague waving at ‘economies of scale’ or something.

This is usually used to end a discussion on single sex provision as we see declining standard across society, cost is ever more important. And who could possibly expect organisations to ignore cost in favour of safety for women and children? (Sarcasm).

I am ever more astounded that so many people in charge of budgets and public facilities have lost their minds to the extent that they will choose the more expensive and dangerous (in several ways) option at the behest of the trans lobby.

It appears to be an abuse of the concept of ‘received knowledge’ where enough people repeat a vaguely plausible ‘fact’ often enough that others parrot it without thought and it becomes widely accepted as ‘fact’, even though it’s not true.

If the following post was too long (I don’t blame you) the recent die-in protests on the pavement remind me of my campaign picture. The design on the left is only permitted in a single sex environment. If there were no single sex spaces in front of toilet cubicles, this design would be obsolete. I am campaigning for safe toilet design.

Yes I understood your husband was in a mobility scooter. I have cared for non-ambulant people of both sexes and used the accessible toilet with both.

My views are not a perception. They are based on evidence. I read court records and other verified accounts by victims and police and establish the location and how and why deaths and crimes happen regarding design. I suppose I am a toilet detective. I have a 90+ page report of how toilet design is really important for health and safety outcomes, with information from academic journals, court reports, newspaper articles, coroners reports, manufacturers, British Standards, designers, architects, government consultations, microbiologists, toilet cleaners, FOIs about data, rape statistics, spike crimes, etc etc. I have pages of real life data.

I have always been led by design then how that changes the outcome to various demographics. For an example, in my database, an old woman would be more likely to be vulnerable in an enclosed toilet due to having a stroke than being attacked. Because of the data I have collected. But always having someone to look out for you can be preventative in lots of ways.

”As for us all being attendants if there is no one there they aren't attendants”
The threat of someone seeing you carrying out a crime can also be preventative. Would there be so many members of the mile-high club if plane toilets weren’t (by space restrictions) mixed sex and private? What is it about the private, mixed sex disabled toilets that meant they had to have a radar key and not single sex toilets?

There’s a good book about world sanitation that someone on here recommended. There’s a phrase that I like to quote because I think it’s really important to note how non domestic toilets are used the world over:

‘Anthropologists and sociologists should be infesting public toilets. There’s nothing else in human society quite like them. Not in society, not quite out of it. Needed but rarely demanded. A place where all sorts of human needs and habitats intersect: fear, disgust, conversation, grooming, sex. It’s an ambiguous space that is not quite in the public eye, though the public uses it. A place of refuge and sociability: of necessity and criminality.’ Rose George, ‘The Big Necessity’ (2008)

The major difference from 2008 is the demanding! Toilets have never been this much in the news. When I started researching designs and how more and more were unregulated and unsafe designs a few ago no one seemed interested.

This next bit you won’t like but it’s objective too. When I looked at why there was a recommendation to the U.K. government that designs of toilets were enclosed for people with long term health conditions, I worked it all the way back to the singular ‘literature’ ‘evidence’ reason, in a report commissioned by the government to look at this demographic. That literature evidence was not from the U.K., nor for people with long term health conditions. It wasn’t based on health and safety. Nor risk assessments. I worked it all the way back to this sentence in an American opinion article: A better solution, supported by many trans activists, and increasingly found in trendy urban nightclubs and restaurants, is to eliminate gender-segregated facilities entirely and treat the public restroom as one single open space with fully enclosed stalls.

So let’s think why fully enclosed stalls would be a good idea for people with long term health conditions. Why did that report to government suggest that would be a good design for people with heart conditions, endometriosis, epilepsy, diabetes, strokes, mental health issues, drug problems etc? Well it didn’t. It didn’t mention any of these long term conditions except a handrail for people who have had strokes. They have dismissed millions of people by not looking at their needs. What is did mention was urinal heights for non binary users, periods only in the context of transmen and the company got a Stonewall award the next year. I am saying this to show that there was bias in that report and they didn’t fulfil their brief.

Going back to that nightclub sentence, surely it’s the owners choosing the design of the toilets in these trendy nightclubs? You could be cynical and say actually why do we think it’s less hassle or attractive for the trendy nightclubs to hide everyone in individual cubicles? This is relevant because it’s illegal to do lots of activities in toilets in this country and my data shows there are indeed a lot of horrendous things that happen in nightclub toilets. Designing-in crime. Health and safety wise, would reverting to make the toilet cubicles less private and in a single sex environment make the bad things less likely to happen? Yes it would and I know that from the coroners, police and court reports.

Now let’s look at the evidence for the Document T consultation for safety. I was interested in this obviously. The consultation response showed overwhelmingly that the safety of trans people was the biggest concern respondent's had. A corresponding percentage also wanted everyone to have access to every cubicle (this immediately makes the design private). So I looked into the reasons why. Could the increase in privacy in design for anyone at their most vulnerable in the cubicle be justified? What was happening? There were thousands of responses to this consultation and the majority mentioned a Stonewall report. So I looked into that specific report. The points for ‘bathrooms’ were that 48% felt uncomfortable in public toilets - it’s implied that’s this is going into the wrong toilet for their sex (other similar surveys say that 80% of the public in general feel uncomfortable but it’s not like for like). The worst example with more details was a man who was shouted at for being in the wrong toilets then pushed out by two women when he wouldn’t leave. This was noted as verbal and physical abuse. I can imagine it was distressing. I can’t find out anything else about this incident or any others that can be verified by any court records etc.

Stonewall has every right to rally supporters to write into the consultation. Supporters have every right to highlight the incidents of going into the wrong sex toilets and to advocate and argue that they should be allowed to go in them. But what has happened is that has squashed the reality of who actually is at risk. The very designs that are being promoted by a coordinated group puts everyone, at their most vulnerable, at risk. It’s also misguided. I have found that ironically so called ‘inclusive’ designs are least bad for healthy men.

I have documents from 40 years ago stating it’s advantageous for gaps under and over the partitions and doors for ventilation, cleaning, supervision and prevention of misuse. My research agrees with that. Door gaps are not compatible with mixed sex design. Mixed sex design is smellier, less clean, can’t be supervised as well and has a greater capacity to be misused.

If the ‘transactivists’ had said we want toilets with door gaps I wouldn’t be campaigning. Everyone else would though! Most people are prepared to put up with a small lack of privacy for the known advantages of health and safety. There is an immediate visceral reaction to toilet door gaps in a mixed sex space.

I would actually really like to stop going on about toilets. However when councils imply they are going to ignore design regulations or spend a load of money creating unisex provision for everyone, then I feel I have a duty to say that is wrong for all the victims in the past. It’s for the ones that could have been prevented. It’s for the ones that will be prevented in the future if people take on board what I am campaigning for. That’s not a perception, it’s fact-based.

Just to clarify I do go out without my husband so he isn't necessarily outside. My husband is disabled I think the days of him rushing to my defence are long gone. If I was attacked he would have a choice, attempt to get into the toilets on his mobility scooter, not easy and then what? Shout at the attacker, I could be dead already. Or get out of the scooter unclip his walking sticks and very slowly make his way in. If the attacker kept still he might be able to hit him with his sticks but the reality is more likely that he will give DH a shove and he will be in the floor unable to get up.

Your perception of risk and safety might be very different to mine.

As for us all being attendants if there is no one there they aren't attendants

That used to be the case with maternity services as well, they'd get you to go to the loo with a sample container and a pen, and you could mark the bottom if you needed to talk to a midwife without your partner. I hope that's still the case, the risk of DV escalates during pregnancy.
The risks for women haven't changed but activists seem determined to remove the safety net.

What is of relevance to why your preference feels safe is you are not on your own when you are using these private toilet rooms. Your husband, someone you can trust, is there outside and he knows you are in there. They are in busy places. Two reasons the situation is safer for you.

I have two points to add to this:

• What works well for a disabled woman out with her husband does not work for an able-bodied autistic woman who goes everywhere alone.
• Some women cannot trust their husbands, because those husbands are abusive. The single-sex public loo has, for a long time, been a place to advertise Rape Crisis and Women's Aid hotlines. In the days of mobile telephones, a single-sex loo is also a place where abused women can browse escape resources and call hotlines out of earshot of their abusers.

I guess the only variable might be whether it takes a couple of hours to notice a unit occupied for an abnormal amount of time in a busy location or whether it is only discovered by a cleaner when the building is closed after hours or whether it is a quiet corridor in a 24 hour building like a hospital where a cleaner will just skip and occupied room and only realise there is a problem days later. I think this extremely tragic situation has occurred already.

If you choke on vomit or your tongue and stop breathing, you don't have hours in which to be found, you have three minutes until irreversible brain damage starts occuring and not much longer before you die.

You'd be talking about extending the partition walls to the ground whilst leaving the door gaps in situ to allow for a collapsed changer to be spotted. This will mean rotting partitions and an end to the "hose the floor down every night" cleaning regime that I often see as an evening swimmer, in return for voyeurs having to offend from within the open space instead of an adjacent cubicle or drill a hole in the partition wall.

The other option is rendered breezeblock walls, which also precludes hosing the floor. This costs a mint.

Thank you that’s kind. I have been on hospital wards where doctors have that moment of clarity too. It seems such an obvious thing when you have ill people hidden away from the very people who can help!

Can I just say as well if the council are on here - I want everyone to be safe in toilets. But changing all provision to be completely private, so everything can be mixed sex, is not the solution. It is not inclusive of many vulnerable people.