Unixsex changing rooms planned for Poynton Leisure Centre.

[vernacularthreshold123]

Poynton Leisure Centre has plans to expand onto a nearby field.
Sadly, they will put in unisex changing facilities, which will make things very unsafe for women and children.
Can anyone help me work out what to do? For example, who are the people who will provide the insurance for the new centre? Surely they must have been able to work out that attacks on woman and children will increase, when Predators in the North West of UK, find out about these plans.

[quote EndoplasmicReticulum]Never happens. Here it is not happening in Yorkshire.

www.harrogateadvertiser.co.uk/news/harrogate-man-jailed-filming-girls-and-women-they-got-undressed-bathrooms-and-cubicles-210471[/quote]
@EndoplasmicReticulum thank you for that - yes - it is 100% unsafe to have UNISEX changing facilities.

I think the main problem is that the very cruel people who put this idea forward already know that it is unsafe.
They don't care.
They're probably as evil and money grabbing at the people who thought "Hey, lets make the women PAY to be safe", over in Hazel Grove.
So it all just becomes a money making scheme.
"If you want to change after a swim, and you are female, PAY EXTRA, otherwise, you'll have to change next to men, and if they are predators, WE DO NOT CARE".
How these people sleep at night, I really do not know.

OP - would it be worth your while to look at this site and contact them?

makespaceforgirls.co.uk/

The initiative has its origins in MN.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4181054-Teenage-girls-and-public-space-facilities-an-update

Unisex changing rooms can be done well. There is one by me where there are central lockers surrounded by individual rooms. Not cubicles, rooms with locking doors. You get complete privacy and can shower and change in peace. There are also emergency pull cords within arms reach everywhere within each individual room. The facility also offers separate men’s and women’s changing rooms, but they have communal changing and showers with flimsy curtains so I prefer the privacy of the unisex locker room.

We are having a brand new swimming pool in our area. I wrote to them two years ago, before I had learned so much on Mumsnet so you have reminded me to write again. I also couldn't get a floor plan! There will be single sex changing in the gym but you won't be able to use those for changing after swimming. They are selling it as a changing village. I totally get it is great for families but still believe there should be single sex provision in addition. This single sex provision needs a gatekeeper.

I would ask to see staff training and policy on sexual predators and how to deal with them (I doubt they have one). For instance will they ring the police every single time there is a complaint? If not why not? Will the predator be banned for life? Will there be signs up about using a camera? Will there be signs up warning people to be on the look out? Will staff do regularly sweeps to look for hidden cameras? So many questions.

Also ask for their safeguarding policy. I'm sure you will be able to pick holes in that for various protected characteristics; sex and religion.

As for someone up thread saying they feel more comfortable in unisex changing and that it would be obvious that someone was filming, err no. Men are generally taller and could just hold their arm up in a locked cubicle over the next one.

The idea if proper unisex facilities with self contained rooms sound fab.

[email protected]

these are the people to contact - it has not yet been confirmed but it looks like the Evil Brigade have planned Unisex changing facilities for Wilmslow Leisure Centre.

'Unisex' is a weasel word. Mixed sexes is what is meant. Funny how reluctant people are to use the accurate description.

@allmywhat

There have been no attacks on anyone.

How could you possibly know that though? The cubicles usually have gaps at the top, it’s not hard for men to abuse the situation.

Why not have single sex spaces as well, for people who want them?

I don’t know how anyone can know this for definite, its not like the leisure centres advertise this

The leisure centres do not CARE about attacks on women and children.
That is what makes this so very very creepy.

Advice to service providers and data from Fair Play For Women
Advice to service providers about female-only changing rooms
A recent study has shown that reports of sexual incidents are at least 10 times more likely in mixed-sex changing rooms compared to single-sex changing rooms

The changing village layout is quite popular. Unfortunately I was assaulted twice as a female child in these type of facilities.

It’s weird. Did women or men ever say to any council give us mixed sexed changing rooms

Were we demanding it from our councils and having protests

Where is this coming from ?

Where IS this coming from? Good question. Cheshire has a real problem with rape - here are the stats.

In Cheshire alone, the number of rapes reported in the year to March 2020 passed 1,000.

Of the total 1,097 rape cases recorded in the county that year, 84 per cent involved female victims, as did 76 per cent of 1,039 sexual assaults dealt with by police in that timeframe.

That means 921 women and girls reported a rape to Cheshire police in 12 months — an average of 2.5 per day.

Surveys also suggest that women and girls are also regularly harassed in public, with a recent YouGov poll for UN Women finding that at least seven out of 10 in the UK had experienced sexual harassment on the street.

Official statistics do not reflect the scale of this specific issue but do show that Cheshire officers investigated 7,463 harassment allegations and 729 stalking cases.

Attacks on women and children in Cheshire are already a problem. Putting in Unisex changing facilities will make the problem so much worse.

Where is this coming from ?

Presume it's a copy and paste of 'guidance' (legally inaccurate) advice from Stonewall and other lobby groups.

I haven't RTFT, so I'm sorry if I'm repeating something already suggested.

My local swimming pool was rebuilt, replacing the single-sex facilities with a mixed-sex so-called "changing village".

It is now a male-dominated space. When I was still going there almost every day, I alerted staff to sexual harassment going on several times. It got so bad, a member of staff was sent to supervise the changing village at most times, just to prevent this from happening. But if you asked the management, they would tell you nothing ever happened.

I didn't know then to make sure to file an official complaint and it's became such an uncomfortable experience that I stopped using it completely. I tried again just before Covid hit, after staying away for a few years, and it's even worse. First thing I saw coming in was a sign saying that you were not allowed to walk around naked (swimming trunks must be worn or something like that). Dude getting changed leaving the door open, that kind of thing, too.

But here's the thing: I use a swimming pool in my parents' hometown. It also has mixed-sex changing rooms. They are designed in a way that prevent harassment by denying people the opportunity to hang around. Not a changing village design. (I'm not saying it's foolproof, but it reduces the risk.)

It works really well and I've never felt unsafe or uncomfortable in there. Neither has my mum.

So adding to the good advice you've already received, my advice would be to look at the proposed layout and if they are determined to go ahead with mixed-sex facilities, point out to them that there are layouts that provide opportunities for harassment and layouts that encourage loitering and layouts that make certain cubicles unsafe (out of sight, around a corner etc) and then ask them to show that they have assessed their proposed layout in terms of user safety specifically looking at harassment and assault.

My swimming pool changing village cubicles have large gaps at the top and bottom. There are bars across the top to prevent someone from climbing on the bench and looking over the dividing wall into the next cubicle. But the bars are spaced so far apart, it's easy to hold a phone or a camera up and angle it into the next cubicle (the bars are at least 5 inches apart). Nothing blocks the gap at the bottom.

So I'd say study the proposed layout and make suggestions as to how they could improve things if your other efforts fail.

2.5 per day and that’s only the women and girls who report

Sigh. Sigh I dunno what to,say sometimes

Looks like Women stood up for themselves in Sale and the Evil Brigade backed down. Yipee.

"The women-only facilities are being retained and we are looking at other options for the family facility.

“The public will be fully consulted on the proposals for family changing before any decisions are made.”

And responding to Rachel on Tuesday afternoon, Liz Patel, councillor for Sale Moor, said: "Just to confirm this decision has been revisited and after discussions with the Council, Sale Leisure centre will be retaining male and female changing facilities and will consult on provision of family changing spaces."

I was one of the women who rang to complain about the plans to remove female changing rooms in Sale. Lots of local women posted about it on their Facebook friends.

The leisure centre were clearly inundated with phone calls.

Fantastic - I totally applaud you "Herewegoagain"... I am so glad that you have led the way in confronting the Evil Brigade. It gives me hope that we can win this battle.

@Anwenandtheicecreambaby

Looks like Women stood up for themselves in Sale and the Evil Brigade backed down. Yipee.

"The women-only facilities are being retained and we are looking at other options for the family facility.

“The public will be fully consulted on the proposals for family changing before any decisions are made.”

And responding to Rachel on Tuesday afternoon, Liz Patel, councillor for Sale Moor, said: "Just to confirm this decision has been revisited and after discussions with the Council, Sale Leisure centre will be retaining male and female changing facilities and will consult on provision of family changing spaces."

Awesome. 🥰🥰🥰🥳🥳😘

Don't you think that there is something more to all this, however?
It's not just the Evil Brigade being full of hate towards women, and pretending that Unisex changing rooms are safe.

It is all about pretending that a sexual assault is not really a crime. It is all about pretending that it is like being mugged. Unpleasant, but just one of those things.

It is all about pretending that women and men are the same.
It is all about pretending that our UK culture needs to be more... Scandinavian....
It is all about pretending that we don't have millions of men who are porn addicted, and mind-controlled into seeing women and girls as objects... nothing more.... so that filming them when they change or use the toilet, is not really a problem. I really do think that the Evil Brigade do "think" like this.

They have to have that psychopathic mindset, to FORCE women and girls all over the UK, to give up using the Leisure centre, give up the dailys swims, give up teaching their kids to swim.... give up so much, simply because the Evil Brigade want to push the "Unisex Changing room agenda"
Ladies
We are dealing with high level psychopaths.

Well done HereWeGoAgain234 that's brilliant news!

This horror is going to happen in Congleton too. They 're calling them "changing villages" to disguise the reality.