A public toilet which could have cost around £40,000 has been out of use for “over two years”, with the council’s lack of care for the facility being called an “absolute disgrace” by a local councillor.

The Changing Places toilet at Central Library in Bexleyheath has been closed for two and a half years, according to Councillor Daniel Francis.

Changing Places toilets are specialised public facilities with hoists and extra space for people with disabilities.

Cllr Francis raised the issue with the Bexleyheath toilet at a Bexley Council meeting on October 19.

He said: “That was vandalised in June or July 2020 period.

"Somebody decided to break into it and sleep in it. And it has been vandalised ever since quite frankly.

"It’s never reopened, every time the council tries to reopen it, it gets vandalised again.”

The specialised public toilet at Central Library was opened in November 2018.

Since then, another Changing Places facility has been added to the nearby Broadway Shopping Centre, but is only available during opening hours.

In March, Bexley Council received £110,000 in government funding to open two more of the specialised toilets in the borough, as part of the Changing Places fund, a £23.5million fund to improve disability access across the UK.

Other London councils such as Harrow and Redbridge received between £40,000 and £50,000 to open one toilet.

Cllr Francis said that he often writes to Bexley Council’s social services about the issue, and was told it was broken into and vandalised again three months ago.

He said: “Quite frankly, it’s a disgrace.

"It’s been two and a half years, and I get Covid was happening at the time. But it’s an absolute disgrace that that facility, which we opened and funded and the administration made a great funfair over four years ago when we opened it, has been in that position for two and a half years.”

Venues that run Changing Places toilets have the option of locking the facilities, with users needing a special RADAR key to use the toilet.

However, Cllr Francis said he thinks vandals may be buying the keys from Amazon and sleeping in the space.

Cllr Francis said: “We’ve had an asset there that is for some of our most vulnerable users and has been out of action for almost two and a half years, and clearly that has a revenue cost to us.

"We’re going to continually have to try and repair it, and clearly we still must be funding the lighting in it.”

Responding to Cllr Francis’ concerns, Paul Thorogood, director of finance for Bexley Council, said: “You are right, it was vandalised at the beginning of the pandemic.

"It was used during the course of the pandemic specifically by testing staff that were using the Broadway, as their secure toilet facility, that we had to provide as part of the agreement with public health colleagues.

"But as of yet, it’s been closed since that point.”

Mr Thorogood said he recalled hearing last week that the adult social care team were taking action to reopen the toilet, and that he would follow up on the issue with colleagues.

He also said there were plans for the facility to be moved to a new landlord, allowing the council’s property services to keep the toilet clean.

In response to Mr Thorogood, Cllr Francis said: “There has surely been a very long ongoing revenue cost to the council of running this facility while it’s been completely out of action for two and a half years, and all I ask is that we try to resolve some of that.”

A Bexley Council spokesperson said: “The changing places toilet opened in Autumn 2018. We were one of the first boroughs to have changing place facilities and are furious that such a valuable provision could be vandalised.

“Unfortunately it has been vandalised on several occasions and has also been occupied by homeless persons. This happened even after we changed from a disabled access key to a more secure lock.

"This has meant that we have not been able to reopen as each time this happens we need to service equipment and give the facility a deep clean.

"We are now looking at additional locks and the introduction of a membership scheme, working with Mencap to provide the administration.

"Once the technology and additional security are in place we will reopen the facility.

“The cost of the toilet was covered by a capital grant to develop the accessible changing places across the borough. As this is a library facility running costs such as electricity are part of the overall Central Library’s running costs.

“We also funded a changing places toilet facility in the Broadway shopping centre from the capital grant and this is currently open and functional during the shopping centre opening times.”

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