New scheme lets shoppers spend a penny for free

Visitors to a market town can now use shop toilets without the pressure of buying anything.

The community group About Dereham said its new Spend a Penny scheme was launched in response to the Norfolk town only having one public loo.

The scheme, backed by Norfolk County Council, came after a Liberal Democrat investigation found that the number of public toilets in Britain fell by 14% between 2018 and 2023.

Glynn Burrows, chair of About Dereham, said: "At the moment, we have a dozen businesses, organisations, churches...we are just hoping during the year other businesses do come on board."

Mr Burrows claimed the town's only public toilet was down a "horrible alleyway".

"It was the victim of an arson attack on a bin, which damaged the toilet as well," he said.

"It's not a nice place to go, but then again, most public toilets are not nice places to go."

Places signed up to the scheme have put a large penny sign in their window to show their support.

Ian Odgers from Dereham Aid Centre said they decided to take part as it was a good use of the centre's facilities.

"It's all about getting them into the town and them not feeling any pressure to come in and use the facilities," he said.

"There's wonderful places to visit and the longer people can spend in the town centre, the better."

Raymond Martin from the British Toilet Association welcomed the new initiative.

"Councils around the country do not legally need to provide public toilets, but they want to look after people with accessibility issues, families with young children, families coming into the towns, but there is a severe lack of money and a severe lack of investment," he said.

"Every person around the country when they leave home, when they go away from home they are going to need to use the toilet at some point therefore we must get our sanitation and hygiene sorted out."

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