Taxpayers off the hook for loo repairs

Women rescued from crucible

The bill for repairing a door to a brand new toilet block that had to be smashed open to free a trapped member of the public won’t fall to taxpayers.

Fire crews had to rescue a woman from one of the toilet cubicles in Exmouth when she got trapped in there due to an issue with the door lock.

The incident was filmed by an onlooker and posted to Facebook, and showed local fire crews using power tools to gain access to the cubicle to let the woman out.

The toilets at Foxholes had only recently been completed, after having been put there in place of the former block.

East Devon District Council, which owns the toilets, said the rollout of new toilets across the district “hadn’t been without its challenges”, and that there had been construction delays in some locations.

“Most seriously, we are aware of an incident [earlier this month] in which a member of the public became stuck in a cubicle due to a fault with the door mechanism,” a council spokesperson said.

“This was understandably distressing for the individual involved, and we want to extend our sincere apologies that this happened. We have investigated what went wrong and are taking the necessary steps to ensure this cannot happen again. We’ve already arranged for the repairs to be carried out, with all costs covered by our contractor, not the public.”

The spokesperson added the council was “committed to learning from the initial rollout and continuously improving how we deliver and operate these essential facilities”. 

Besides Exmouth, new toilets have also been opened in Budleigh Salterton, Honiton and Seaton.

The council said it would be inspecting all door locks at the new toilet blocks in the coming weeks, and had already replaced some as a preventative measure.

It added it would also be improving its emergency response procedure, including the potential for an automatic door release system to prevent lock-in incidents, and considering clearer signage with “essential safety information”.

The new toilets command what the council called a “small contactless fee”, which it said went towards maintaining and cleaning the toilets.