Timely win for Bristolians in need of toilets!

Back in 2020/21 the Bristol branch of ACORN fought a campaign to force the city council to reopen the public toilets. They managed to engage a huge number of Bristolians on an issue that’s very deeply felt, with thousands responding to our consultation on the issue and many taking action against the council. 

The council closed 18 public toilets in the city centre in 2017, replacing them with a dubious ‘community toilets’ scheme. Our members visited each one of these and found most were not even accessible, out of order considering public toilets are crucial to the mobility of the elderly and people with disabilities.

ACORN member Geoff said "I live in Kingswood, part of South Gloucestershire, and like many others have avoided visiting central Bristol for some years, simply because Marvin Rees closed the toilets! I used to also enjoy a walk round Fishponds where the toilets outside the park were a Godsend on a cold winter's day. I would love to get back to those visits." 

Not content with closing the public toilets in the first place, former Labour Mayor of Bristol, Marvin Rees, was to get another chance to play the villain. After the long and hard fought campaign, our union forced a council vote on reopening the toilets and managed to convince a majority of councillors to vote with us and the public. Unfortunately, Rees used his veto power as Mayor to kill the issue once and for all.

Or so he, presumably, thought.

Last year, in the most recent council elections, the position of Mayor was done away with altogether to be replaced by a committee system. The Green party emerged as the largest overall party and our members pressed them to add reopening toilets to their agenda, which they did!

But since then, the Greens have gone quiet on the issue, giving Labour councillors the chance to engage in the sort of foolishness that leads to distrust of politicians and try to add an amendment to the most recent budget on the subject of reopening - they didn’t care so much when they were in power did they?

The Greens have now committed to reopening toilets within two years and you can be sure our members will be there to make sure they do. It’s a disgrace that such a vital public utility was ever removed in the first place; they aren’t a bargaining chip or a political football, they’re integral to members of the public being able to live their lives. And ACORN the Union has brought them back.