Bog Standard Campaign – better school toilets for pupils

• Dirty, smelly toilets
• Broken or missing seats, doors, toilet roll holder, taps
• Lack of basic provisions - toilet paper; soap; warm water; hand drying facilities; sanitary disposal
• Lack of privacy – doors that don’t lock; cubicles that can be peered over or under easily; urinals that can be viewed from outside the toilet area
• Bullies and/or smokers hanging out in the toilets
• Restricted access to toilets – toilets out-of-bounds or locked during lessons; limited access during breaks; breaks too short to permit access; no afternoon breaks; timed toilet visits
• Toilets inconveniently located; not accessible to pupils, including those with special needs

Pupils' toilets project an image of a school - good or bad - and have an effect on pupil morale and behaviour. The worst toilets often become a magnet for bad behaviour which turns them into a no-go area for other pupils. Poor toilets and denial of access also contribute to absenteeism.

Some adults belittle the issue of pupils’ toilets. However, for children who have no choice but to spend at least half of every weekday in school until the age of 16 or more, school toilets is often the most concerning issue for pupils. We now realise that the impact on their physical and psychological health can be serious and far-reaching.

Research from Sheffield Children’s Hospital of children attending paediatric outpatient clinics (a quarter had problems relating to constipation) over a four-week period showed that over half of all the pupils avoided school toilets, with around a quarter prepared to use them only if desperate.

The impact on health, well being and learning
“How are we supposed to concentrate on the lesson if we are bursting for the loo?” Jenny, aged 13.

Physical discomfort from avoiding or having been denied access to school toilets can affect a child’s ability to concentrate in lessons, thereby affecting their ability and willingness to learn.

Inadequate toilet facilities and denial of access can lead to health problems, both now and later in life. Doctors and nurses often see children and young people with medical conditions such as wetting, urinary infections, constipation and soiling. Such disorders can have longstanding repercussions for the child and are costly to the NHS. Bedwetting alone affects around half a million children aged between five and 16 years old and the physical and psychological effects on children can be devastating. Children express real fears, disgust and anxiety around having to use substandard toilets and not being able ‘to go’ according to their needs. The negative psychiatric consequences may include the development of phobias. One such phobia is paruresis: difficulty or inability urinating in the vicinity of others, which may be linked to the experience of school toilets, particularly during adolescence and can leave some adults virtually housebound.

Poor hygiene standards in toilets and sanitation facilities lead to increased infections or diseases, such as bacterial diarrhoea and Hepatitis A, (DH 1999) and carry a high likelihood of being transmitted throughout the school community and beyond.

Campaign Aims

• To increase public awareness of how improving access* to and provision of pupils’ toilet facilities can benefit children’s health and learning
• To raise the standard of provision and access to toilet facilities in all schools nationally
• To ensure that UK and EU regulations adopt and enforce acceptable minimum standards for access to and provision of drinking water and toilet facilities for all pupils in school

* Access refers both to allowing pupils to go to the toilet when they need to and providing facilities that are suitable for use by all pupils, including those with special needs.

Campaign organisers
The Bog Standard campaign is organised by ERIC – Education and Resources for Improving Childhood Continence. ERIC is a national charity which provides information and support on childhood bedwetting, daytime wetting, soiling and constipation to families and health professionals.

ERIC is also behind the Water is Cool in School campaign. This campaign aims to improve the quality of provision and access to fresh drinking water for children in schools. The two campaigns are linked because if pupils are to be encouraged to drink throughout the day, it is important that they be allowed to visit user-friendly toilets when they need to.

The Bog Standard campaign has been developed in partnership with the following organisations:

• The Community Practitioners’ and Health Visitors’ Association (CPHVA) represents 18000 health visitors, school nurses, practice nurses and registered nurses in the UK. Members at their AGM called on the CPHVA to support ERIC’s campaign work
• School Councils UK promotes and develops effective student councils in British schools through training and resource provision. School Councils list toilets amongst their top common complaints
• The British Toilet Association is a campaigning body to raise the standard of all public ‘away from home’ toilets wherever located – including schools

A large group of health and education professional support the campaign.

Areas of Concern

Campaign in Northern Ireland
The Northern Ireland arm of the campaign was launched in September 2005 in Belfast at the World Toilet Summit and is run by a regional working group, in association with ERIC.

Government legislation
There is a serious gap in legislation, which fails to ensure adequate toilets for pupils while guaranteeing that adults have the right by law to decent facilities. This represents a clear inequality.

Currently the only legislation governing pupils’ toilets is limited to setting out a minimum number of toilets and washbasins (The Education (School Premises) Regulations 1999), whereas legislation for toilets for adults in the workplace, including teachers in school, sets out comprehensive requirements, which include their suitability, accessibility, hygiene, condition and the provision of hand washing and drying facilities (The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992).

Moreover, adult workplace toilets have further specific requirements, including privacy and stocking of toilet paper, in the Workplace Health, Safety and Welfare, Approved Code of Practice (1993).

The Bog Standard Campaign believes that legislation and Codes of Practice should be passed to regulate the standard of pupils’ toilets and washrooms in their working environment, which at least match existing legislation for adults in the workplace.

Inspections
Ofsted inspections (since September 2005) require evidence of “The extent to which schools enable learners to be healthy.” Included is the requirement: “Learners are encouraged and enabled to eat and drink healthily.” Toilets are not assessed although the state of the toilets and denial of toilet use can be a major barrier to pupils drinking. The toilets also affect pupils’ health and well being in their own right and affect pupils’ attainment and attendance levels.

Bog Standard wants the inspection of pupils’ toilets included in all Ofsted inspections – to include the condition, suitability and number of toilets and washrooms and when pupils are permitted to use them.

Funding
Raising awareness of the importance of allowing pupils access to toilets when needed, ensuring adequate minimum legislation to ensure decent standards, plus inspecting and enforcing regulations, are vital. These would not necessarily involve a big increase in expenditure - although it should be recognised that many toilets have deteriorated to such an extent that they are in need of major refurbishment.

Human Rights
Our survey findings and the findings of the Children’s Commissioner for Wales published in 2004 (“Lifting the lid on the nation’s school toilets”) identify serious cause for concern about the undermining of children and young people’s rights through the lack of suitable toilets and sanitation facilities in schools. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child “reinforces fundamental human dignity” and “seeks respect for children”. Not providing children with private, well-maintained toilets and not allowing them to go when they need to is an infringement of their human rights.

Beyond Bog Standard
An increasing number of schools are recognising how meeting their pupils’ needs in this area benefits their school; they have worked with pupils to create satisfactory toilets or, in a few cases, toilets that would not look out of place in any good quality office or hotel and with monitoring and cleaning regimes to match. These schools show what can be achieved.

Benefits of Improving Pupils’ Toilets
Pupils’ satisfaction with their environment can affect behaviour and self-esteem, and ultimately willingness and ability to learn. All pupils should feel that their wellfare is being taken seriously, and their needs are respected. Furthermore, improvements in toilet standards would be cost effective, preventing or alleviating future consequential urinary, bowel and kidney problems and outbreaks of infectious diseases.

The standard of pupils' toilets, both access and provision, needs to be made a high priority. Standards in teacher’s toilet facilities are covered by regulation. The same standards need to apply to a pupil’s working environment, backed up by inspection and enforcement.

School Toilet Charter (children’s version)

Information provided by the Bog Standard campaign – Better Toilets for Pupils 2006
Website: www.bog-standard.org

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