PUBLIC toilets in Calstock and Gunnislake will cost 14% of the precept if the community decides to keep them open, parish councillors were told this week.

The toilets will remain open this year, with grant help from Cornwall Council, while Calstock Parish Council consults with the public as to their future beyond April 2014.

At a meeting last week parish councillors were told that the cost of running the toilets was £14,000 a year which was 14% of the precept.

This year Cornwall Council is offering a grant of £7,000 and an upgrade if the parish takes them over, but after that the funding is likely to stop.

The local authority, which is having to make huge savings this year, says is has no statutory duty to run public conveniences.

It is planning to close 114 out of 240 public loos in the county and has been consulting with parish and town councils with a view to them being run at a local level. This would reduce the money it spends on public toilets by half, from £3-million to £1.5-million.

Calstock councillor Dick Hoile said: 'We have to decide what we are going to do with the toilets otherwise we might lose them.

'Cornwall Council says it cannot give us a grant for longer than 12 months. I suggest we take them on for the next 12 months as we have agreed the money in the precept. It will give us time to do a public consultation as there is no doubt in my mind that Cornwall Council wants to close them.

'This will give us some breathing space to ask the people if they want us to use some of the precept on keeping the toilets open. In 2015 there is the possibility that we will have no grant funding and have to fund them to the tune of £14,000.'

Council chairman Jerome Irons said he did not like the idea of paying business rates on public toilets and having visited the toilets he was unimpressed by the once a week cleaning regime.

The parish council agreed to set up a working party to negotiate the lease of the toilets and the four car parks in the parish, Gunnislake, Harrowbarrow and two at Calstock.