WEST Devon Council was this week slammed for telling parishes they should pay towards cleaning public toilets in villages.
Parish councils claim they are being ignored and discriminated against in the borough?s bid to cut costs.
The decision to ask parishes to pay 30% towards toilet cleaning was made by the borough?s environment committee on Tuesday. Councillors were considering proposals to close toilets in rural parishes throughout the borough.
Seven toilets at Lifton, Milton Abbot, Bere Ferrers, Buckland Monachorum, South Zeal, Northlew and Sampford Courtenay, were earmarked for closure, in a £10,000 cost-cutting exercise.
Councillors decided those at Milton Abbot and Lifton should be shut from February 28 2003 ? a recommendation that will go before the full council on November 5.
Fred Reeves, chairman of Lifton Parish Council, was ?totally disappointed? with the decision.
He said: ?We have 65 new houses being erected in Lifton and West Devon will enjoy an income from those. They are shedding their costs to keep the community charge the same.
?If they are asking Lifton to pay 30% of the cleaning for all the other toilets in the borough, that illustrates the craziness of the whole thing.
?They are taking away a worthwhile facility ? West Devon seem to have given up listening to parishes in almost every sense.?
Cllr Reeves said the parish was trying to work on a project to update the village hall and had asked the borough if the toilets could be kept open until then, when hall toilets could become a public facility.
But he said the borough did not accept the idea.
?There was just no consultation. They will say there was ? but their consultation was to tell us they were going to close the toilets. It?s all terribly disappointing.?
Cllr Bill Cann, chairman of South Tawton Parish Council, said: ?We will be meeting next Monday to discuss this but personally, I wouldn?t be for paying 30% ? they should provide these services, I don?t think it?s fair to ask the parish council.
?I?m very pleased they?ve gone back on closing South Zeal toilets but I think we pay our community charge and get very little for it in the rural areas.
?I just hope this will be resolved but I don?t think we will be paying anything ? we certainly feel this is discrimination against rural parishes.?
But John Grierson, chairman of Northlew Parish Council, said that ?in the circumstances?, the decision was a fair one.
Borough deputy chief executive David Inman told the environment committee the toilets at Milton Abbot were ?past their sell-by date?.
He said toilets at Lifton were little used and closed on a number of occasions when monitoring visits were made.
He said: ?We simply do not have the money to maintain these toilets. The budgets over the years have been restricted and restricted.?
But Cllr Ted Sherrell said closure of toilets was ?alienating? people.
He said: ?We have to bite the bullet and say we will keep all these toilets open. I know it has to be paid for, but I don?t think it?s a good or right thing to return these toilets to the parishes.?
Cllr Christine Grills, of Bere Ferrers, said the toilets there were well used. She added that the borough actively promoted tourism in the Bere Peninsula.
?What is the point of backing these enterprises if there are no facilities?? said Cllr Grills.
It was ?not reasonable? to ask the parish council to take on responsibility for the toilets. she added.
But Cllr Dick Eberlie called for a new strategy.
He said: ?The maintenance and care of public lavatories should be the responsibility of parish councils. They ultimately should pay from their precept.?
Cllr Nicholas Waterhouse said if parish councils had responsibility for toilets, those that were genuinely not needed would soon disappear.
And Cllr Peter Hill, chairman of the Devon Association of Parish Councils, said local government was changing and services were being handled at lower levels.
?I hope parish councils are forward-looking enough to take on these tasks ? it will lead to better relations between them and us,? he said.