Changing Places toilets consultation: easy read version

Changing Places Toilets Consultation: Easy Read Version

Introduction

Changing Places Toilets are larger toilets for people with special needs. These toilets enable people with complex care needs to take part in everyday activities like travel, shopping, family days out or going to a sporting event.

There are 187 Changing Places Toilets across Scotland but there is no law that says buildings have to have one.

A new law that says there have to be Changing Places Toilets in some types of larger new building would mean there would be more of these toilets across Scotland to meet people’s needs.

Background

Building Regulations

There are rules that say how new buildings should be built. These rules are called ‘building regulations.’ Building regulations in Scotland are supposed to:

• help keep people who use buildings healthy and safe
• make buildings easier to use, and
• save energy that we use for things like heating and lighting.

Scottish building regulations say how many toilets there should be in buildings. The number of toilets is based on the biggest number of people who could be in the building at one time. These rules cover standard toilets and accessible toilets for disabled people.

The current building regulations do not say there have to be any Changing Places Toilets in these buildings.

What are Changing Places Toilets?

A Changing Places Toilet (CPT) gives toilet and washing facilities for people with multiple and complex disabilities who have one or more carers. It offers enough space for a disabled person when they are not in their wheelchair, as well as their wheelchair and one or two carers.

It also has equipment to enable safe and easy use of the facilities, including a changing bench big enough for an adult, a hoist to help lift people up and use the toilet and a toilet with lots of space around it for carers.

You can find out more about these toilets on the website: http://www.changing-places.org/.

Why are we consulting?

Aim

We would like to hear your ideas on how we can change building regulations so that Changing Places Toilets have to be part of new or changed buildings.

Development of Changing Places Toilets

The Scottish Government has been working with PAMIS (Promoting a More Inclusive Society) and the Changing Places Consortium to raise awareness about Changing Places Toilets.

There are Changing Places Toilets in a wide range of buildings where members of the public have easy access. This has been widely seen as a good move. At this time there are 187 Changing Places Toilets across Scotland.

Research shows that there are about 20,000 people in Scotland who benefit from the use of Changing Places Toilet facilities.

Scottish Ministers think we could benefit many more members of our communities if building regulations made it a rule that new buildings had to have Changing Places Toilets.

What is being done now

Building regulations say that there have to be a certain number of standard accessible toilets in new buildings. But standard accessible toilets do not always have enough room for people who need help from one or more carers. They do not have special equipment for helping people with special mobility needs.

Changing Places Toilets would have the right amount of space and the right equipment to support people with complex care needs.

If there is a Changing Places Toilet in a building, people with complex care needs can take part in everyday activities like travel, shopping, family days out or going to a sporting event.

Changing Places Toilets should be built along with standard toilets. They should not take the place of standard toilets. This is because people who use CPTs will probably need to be in the toilet for a longer time than people who would use a standard toilet.

Buildings that should have Changing Places Toilets

The Building Standards guide has a list of places that should have Changing Places Toilets. These buildings are open to the public, have people who look after the building and help visitors and will generally have regular opening hours so people know they can go in and use the CPT.

There is already guidance that says it is good for CP toilets to be available in these types of buildings:

• buildings you use when travelling somewhere - large railway stations, airports and motorway services
• sport and leisure centres, large hotels
• museums, concert halls, art galleries, and churches
• sport stadiums and big theatres
• large shops and shopping centres
• town halls, civic centres and big public libraries
• schools, colleges and universities
• hospitals and health centres
• places you visit like theme parks, beaches and parks.

What we want to do

Suggested changes to building regulations

We know that it is not always going to be possible to include Changing Places Toilets in smaller buildings, but we think a lot of bigger buildings that we use should have them.

For a new building, a Changing Places Toilet should be included in:

• a shopping centre/mall bigger than 30,000 square metres
• a single shop bigger than 10,000 square metres
• a place of entertainment or meeting place that holds more than 2,000 people
• a hospital
• a secondary school with community facilities
• a leisure centre or similar building containing a swimming pool

In an existing building with no Changing Places Toilet, one should be added where:

• any of the buildings listed above is made by changing another building, or
• where the building is made bigger by 25% or more.

A Changing Place Toilet should be built as well as standard and accessible toilets. A CPT cannot take the place of a standard or accessible toilet. A CPT should be in a place where users can get to it easily and quickly without having to pay or go through a security barrier.

This is a picture to show what a Changing Places Toilet should look like.

A Changing Place Toilet should have enough space to allow a user to be helped by carers and be a minimum of 3 metres wide by 4 metres long. The door should be at least 1 metre wide and the ceiling should be at least 2.4 metres high. The floor should not be slippery when wet.

A Changing Place Toilet should include the following:

• a toilet against a wall with space around it for the carers
• a height adjustable wash hand basin
• a ceiling-mounted hoist that can lift and move people around the room
• a height adjustable adult sized changing bench
• a privacy screen that can fold away
• in a building like swimming pools or leisure centres with changing rooms, there should be a shower as well.

More information on planning a CPT can be found at the website of the Changing Places Consortium (www.changing-places.org).

Consultation questions

When answering each question, please give us the reasons for your answer. We need this so we can understand your views and the issues involved.

Question 1

Do you agree that building regulations should ask for Changing Places Toilets in some types of larger building?

Yes ☐ No ☐

Can you tell us why you think this?

Question 2

Do you think the types of buildings that we say should have a Changing Places Toilet is OK?

Yes ☐ No ☐

Can you tell us why you think this?

Question 3

Are there any other times where you think that a Changing Places Toilet should be added to a building?

Yes ☐ No ☐

Can you tell us why you think this?

Question 4

Please tell us anything else you want to say about Changing Places Toilets in building regulations.

Giving your answers

Please give us your answers using the Scottish Government’s consultation website, Citizen Space:

https://consult.gov.scot/building-standards/changing-places-toilets.

You can save and return to your answers while the consultation is still open.

Please give your answers before the closing date of 13 May 2019.

If you are unable to give us your answers online, please complete the Respondent Information Form (see “What we do with your answers” below) and send it to:

Thomson Dyer
Building Standards Division
Scottish Government
Denholm House
Almondvale Business Park
Livingston, EH54 6GA

What we do with your answers

If you give us your answers using Citizen Space (http://consult.scotland.gov.uk/), you will be taken to the Respondent Information Form. Please us the form to tell us what you want us to do with your answers and if you are happy for your answers to be published so people can see them online.

If you are unable to give your answers online, please complete and return the Respondent Information Form along with response. If you ask for your response not to be published, we will treat it as private and will not publish it.

What happens next

If you have given permission for your answers to be made public, and we have checked that they contain nothing inappropriate, your answers will be made available to the public at http://consult.scotland.gov.uk.

If you use Citizen Space to respond, you will get an email with a copy of your answers.

Following the closing date, all answers will be looked at and considered along with any other information we have.

Comments and complaints

If you have any comments about how this consultation has been done, please send them to:

Michelle Williamson
Building Standards Division
Scottish Government
Denholm House
Almondvale Business Park
Livingston, EH54 6GA

Scottish Government consultations

The Government asks people for their thoughts before they make new laws. This called a ‘Consultation’. It gives us the chance to think about your opinion on a change we are planning to make.

You can find all our consultations online: http://consult.scotland.gov.uk. Each consultation explains what we are thinking of doing, as well as a way for you to give us your views, either online, by email or by post.

Consultations can include seeking views in a number of different ways, like public meetings, focus groups, or other online methods such as Dialogue (https://www.ideas.gov.scot).

Answers to consultation questions will be used to help make decisions, along with other information and evidence. We will publish a report for every consultation.

Respondent Information Form

A copy of the Respondent Information Form for this consultation is included later in this consultation document. This can be filled in by hand if you are unable to give your answers online.