The law on mixed sex toilets in schools

[Barracker]

Can someone help with the specifics of this please?
I know the law requires separate sex loos in secondary schools (UK).
What I don't know is how many are specified to meet the requirements. I also don't know if mixed sex loos actually breach the requirements entirely, or if it's permissable to have some as long as the same sex provision is adequate.

My daughter's school provides some girl only loos within the sports changing rooms. Not easy to get to from the opposite end of the secondary school.
But
The MAIN loos in the school are like this:
An open plan room off a busy corridor. There's no door into this room it's just a large open 'foyer' space. Large bank of cubicles either side of a central washing area. The whole room is wide open to the corridor. You can be standing in the corridor, watching kids go in, choose a cubicle, come out, wash hands, leave. I've attached a pic of a similar set up except in my daughter's school the basins afford less privacy because there's no floor to ceiling barrier like on this pic.
You can hear, obviously.
The whole set up of the pic is visible from the busy corridor.
Boys use the left side of the bank of cubicles, girls the right, but they're all part of the same open plan room. They all wash together at the basins.

Now. Questions.

1. Is it enough legally to provide a few compliant (and not very accessible) same-sex loos, whilst the major toileting facilities are mixed-sex as I've described? Or are there very specific ratios of numbers and accessibility of same sex provision?
2. Is it even permissable at all to have a huge, primarily mixed sex set up as I've described? Completely open to the corridor?

Obviously it's a yuck situation but I would like to know more about the legislation and what specifically it dictates.

Thanks to anyone who knows and doesn't mind taking the time to explain specifics!

I honestly do not know why you keep arguing about this. These are blocks of toilets, cubicles that do not have actual walls between them. Blocks of toilets must be single-sex. You're welcome to check with the building regulations experts on this who have already emphasised that a unisex facility is a self-enclosed room with floor to ceiling walls and a door. Having managed a few private building projects (and argued with building standards about toilets), I can assure you that what constitutes a wall is also strictly defined in UK building regulations experts (They put them on each and every plan I still have in the house). So these are not walls between the cubicles and therefore these are blocks not self-contained rooms.

Arguing about this aside, all the usual problems of mixed-sex toilets apply here such as noise and smell not being contained which they are in unisex facilities, boys being able to observe how long girls spend in the toilets, girls being too ashamed to ask for help when they need it because boys may overhear, boys opening doors from the outside and taking pictures of the girl on the toilet - these are all things that have happened in such facilities.

Are you okay with that?

Strike that second experts, it does not belong there at all.

Oh, the irony of arguing whilst complaining that someone else is arguing. I'm simply referring to the wording of the regulations about school facilities. Obviously it's not as clear-cut as you suggest, otherwise (a) school facilities wouldn't be built by this and (b) it's highly likely that they would have been successfully challenged by now.

They have been successfully challenged in quite a number of schools that have built these, across the entire UK, many of which have subsequently changed the facilities back to single-sex. This has been going on for a few years after all.

And the school regulations do not exist in a vacuum. They refer to other regulations and must meet a number of requirements that are not listed in this non-statutory guidance booklet. Which is why building regulations experts have unequivocally stated that these mixed-sex facilities do not meet the required regulations.

I refer you once again to the fact that there is no actual wall separating these cubicles in these blocks of toilets, because the sides are made of the same materials as the doors. And they do not open to a circulation space but are contained within a sanitary facility. Both of those facts disqualify this facility from being a unisex facility as per the wider regulations (ie the kind of single-entry facility that may be used by either sex.)

I would also refer you to the fact that the Welsh regulations do not allow any unisex facilities for use by either sex at all, they stipulate that all sanitary facilities must be sex segregated and yet here, too, are multi-entry mixed-sex facilities built. As we've just seen reported in the press, this has been met with huge protests by the pupils affected.

They are being built in this way in clear breach of the regulations. Just like in England. The same applies to Scotland. Building regulations there also make no allowance at all for any type of mixed-sex multi-entry sanitary facility in school buildings, facilities must be sex segregated. Unisex facilities must contain a wash basin within the individual enclosed space behind a lockable door. And yet mixed-sex multi-entry facilities are being built in Scotland, too, in clear breach of unequivocal, clear cut regulations.

And I am wondering why you are arguing that multi-entry mixed-sex facilities like the one illustrated here meet requirements that state multi-entry facilities must be single-sex because I am not sure what your point is. You think these are great?

I'm simply stating what the law says. Your attempt to try to insert other implications into perfectly straightforward posts looks very much like someone trying to pick a fight, and I'm not playing.

I seriously think that we need some form of inspectorate set up. Who go into schools and check this kind of thing out. Tell the schools they are breaking the law and insist on action. I do absolutely see it as a slow erosion of privacy and dignity and thus barriers. For girls and boys. We went on loads of secondary tours last year and loads of them were like this. As for the notion of open plan toilets reducing bullying I think that is just another typical school cop out. Schools should DEAL with the bullies. Remove them if they won’t behave. It’s not acceptable to take away privacy in response to bullying- take away the bullying instead. Wonder if the staff toilets are like this??

Bearing in mind erratic periods when starting out- How are they meant to deal with washing out blood stained pants and drying them out under the hand drier to wear again, with boys around them?

I went to an all girls school with nearly 2000 other girls for 7 years - never once have I ever seen someone do this. I can’t imagine that any teenage girl would ever take their bloody knickers off, rinse them in a public sink (whether visible by boys or girls) and dry them under a hand dryer to wear again.

I definitely do not want to have to be the parent at a new school who drops the illegal toilet email. So how do you deal with this if toilets aren’t compliant? Do you speak to the council?

The schools here that have those toilets are all new builds so presumably subject to building regulations. How come those inspectors don't know of the regulations then?