Search for
Search for
Search for'The people have spoken' and the city's closed toilets will reopen
Thursday, November 20, 2008, 07:30
Opposition parties voted together at a full council meeting to force the controlling Liberal Democrat cabinet to include plans in its strategy for next year's budget to reverse its previous decision to shut 10 toilets in the city.
Conservative group leader Philip Hickson received backing from the Labour group in his move to save toilets which have not yet been shut and reopen those that have.
He said: "This is victory. The decision on the closures has been reversed."
The budget strategy was set by cabinet at its last meeting.
It provides a template for how the council will go forward in preparing the budget for 2009-10.
But the cabinet's decision had to be approved by the full council last night and Mr Hickson spoke out against it.
He instead moved an amendment which said the strategy should be backed as long as the budget included provision for public toilets.
That amendment was agreed by all Conservative and Labour councillors.
Now the Lib Dem cabinet will have to draw up its budget in line with the strategy.
The cabinet had said the toilet closures were needed because money had not been set aside in this year's budget to keep them open and they were attracting anti-social behaviour.
Of the 10 toilets, those at Markeaton Park island; High Street, Chellaston; Boulton Lane, Alvaston; Nottingham Road cemetery; and the library and cemetery in Spondon are in the process of being closed.
Two more, at The Spot and Victoria Street, were scheduled to close in January and the final two, at the Assembly Rooms and Eagle Market, were due to shut once the bus station opened later next year.
But the move sparked an outcry through the letters pages of the Evening Telegraph and, at last night's meeting, Labour presented a petition of nearly 11,000 names collected as part of its Leave Our Loos Alone campaign.
The group's leader, Councillor Chris Williamson, said it was overwhelmingly the wish of residents, businesses and the majority of councillors for the toilets to be kept open.
"The people have spoken," he said.
"Having 11,000 signatures on a petition is nearly unprecedented. I also wrote to the businesses in the Cathedral Quarter and all those who responded said that to close public toilets there would have an extremely damaging impact on their businesses."
Liberal Democrat deputy leader Lucy Care said it was the actions of the previous Labour administration which had led to the need to close the toilets.
She said: "In March, they put forward a budget which they approved and we voted against and one of the items was the cut to the public conveniences budget."
Mr Williamson said that that was not the case and that his party had dismissed initial considerations about closing the toilets.
The full budget will have to be agreed formally in March.
