Freedom of Information Request about the toilet facilities in London

Waiting for an internal review by Enfield Council of their handling of this request.

Dear Enfield Council,

I am writing for a formal request of information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA 2000), regarding the toilet facilities in the boroughs of London. Please provide me details of the following questions:

1. How many public toilets are available in your council’s borough?
2. How much did your council spend in maintenance of the public toilets, cleaners etc, during the last financial year 2018/2019?
3. Does your council pay to Transport for London for the toilet services? If yes, how much was this last financial year 2018/2019?
4. How many toilets are out of service in your borough?
5. How many reports for antisocial behaviors have been made during last year, that happened on toilets, and how many toilets have been closed for antisocial behavior or vandalism?

Please give me an accurate answer, in a spreadsheet format, NOT TEXT or PDF, as I need to analyze the data’s.

Your faithfully,

Santino Pani

complaintsandinformation, Enfield Council

Classification: OFFICIAL

Dear Sir/Madam

 

Thank you for making a request for information to the London Borough of
Enfield.

 

We are aiming to respond to your request within 20 working days and will
let you know if we hold the information you requested and if we can
release it under the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

 

We are now making an initial assessment of your request and we will
contact you if any clarification is needed.

 

If you have any queries regarding your request, please contact us at
[Enfield Council request email] quoting your reference CRM FOI
7098   

 

Regards,

 

Complaints and Access to Information Team

 

 

 

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complaintsandinformation, Enfield Council

1 Attachment

Classification: OFFICIAL

Dear Santino Pani

 

Thank you for your email dated 28 November 2019where you requested
information about public toilets.

 

I can confirm that the London Borough of Enfield holds this information.

 

Request and Response

 

1. How many public toilets are available in your council’s borough? 125

 

2. How much did your council spend in maintenance of the public toilets,
cleaners etc, during the last financial year 2018/2019?

 

2018/19 we spent £14,100 on the community toilet scheme – payments to
businesses in the borough to make their toilets available for the general
public to use

 

3. Does your council pay to Transport for London for the toilet services?
If yes, how much was this last financial year 2018/2019?  No

 

4. How many toilets are out of service in your borough? 1

 

5. How many reports for antisocial behaviors have been made during last
year, that happened on toilets, and how many toilets have been closed for
antisocial behavior or vandalism? We do not hold an accurate record of ASB
incidents for the toilets however, three toilet blocks have been
permanently closed due repeat vandalism and misuse within the Parks

 

 

If you are dissatisfied with the handling of your request, you have the
right to ask for an internal review. Internal review requests should be
submitted within two months of the date of receipt of the response to your
original letter and should be addressed to:

 

Complaints and Access to Information Team Email

[1][Enfield Council request email]

 

Please remember to quote the reference number above in any future
communications.

 

If you are not content with the outcome of the internal review, you have
the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner for a
decision. The Information Commissioner can be contacted at: Information
Commissioner’s Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9
5AF

 

Kind Regards

 

 

Theresa Willard

Complaints and Information Coordinator

Complaints and Information Team

Chief Executive Department

Enfield Council

Silver Street

Enfield

EN1 3XY

 

Email: [2][email address]

 

‘Enfield Council is committed to serving the whole borough fairly,
delivering excellent services and building strong communities.’

 

[3]Signature

 

Classification: OFFICIAL

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Dear complaintsandinformation,

Thank you for your response.
However, I am not sure you provided me the right data, and I ask you to verify it.
On Q.1, you answered that in your borough, there are 125 toilets managed by your council, which I find very strange, considering that in your borough live around 330,000 people, and in other boroughs, more populated, there are many less toilets.
Maybe you counted also the private toilets facilities? I need the data only of the toilets managed by and at expenses of your council administration.

On Q.2, you are claiming that the expenses for the toilets maintenance is £14,100, which does not match with the data of 125 toilets you provided on Q.1. Can you check this data again?

Further, the response in general has been provided in the wrong format. I asked a spreadsheet, so that I can analyze the data, and compare it with those of the other councils. It should be therefore a XLSX or CVS file, which should contain only data in numbers, not comments. I need at this point a proper answer for Q.1 and 2.
If you are unable to answer these questions, please pass this request to your FOI review team.

Thank you very much

Yours sincerely,

Santino Pani

Dear Enfield Council,
Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.
I am writing to request an internal review of Enfield Council's handling of my FOI request 'Freedom of Information Request about the toilet facilities in London'.
I made this request on the 28th of November last year, and I received a response from your council, which did not seem to be accurate; therefore on the 30th of December I requested to clarify their response, and by law I should have received a response within 20 working days, but till now (almost 32 days later) I have not received any.

Here below is the full text of my request, and the responses I received:
“I am writing for a formal request of information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FOIA 2000), regarding the toilet facilities in the boroughs of London. Please provide me details of the following questions:
1. How many public toilets are available in your council’s borough?
2. How much did your council spend in maintenance of the public toilets, cleaners etc, during the last financial year 2018/2019?
3. Does your council pay to Transport for London for the toilet services? If yes, how much was this last financial year 2018/2019?
4. How many toilets are out of service in your borough?
5. How many reports for antisocial behaviors have been made during last year, that happened on toilets, and how many toilets have been closed for antisocial behavior or vandalism?
Please give me an accurate answer, in a spreadsheet format, NOT TEXT or PDF, as I need to analyse the data’s.
My comments to these responses are in brackets ().

Response on 24/12/2019

Q.1: How many public toilets are available in your council’s borough? R: “125”
(125 on a borough of 333,000 inhabitants, whilst Barnet, the most populate boroughs, has only 26 toilets? How it is possible?)
Q.2: How much did your council spend in maintenance of the public toilets,
cleaners etc, during the last financial year 2018/2019?
R: “2018/19 we spent £14,100 on the community toilet scheme – payments to businesses in the borough to make their toilets available for the general public to use.”
(How is possible to have a such low budget for 125 toilets, if this data is accurate? If I divide this data, £14,100 by 125, the council should spend less than £113 per toilet, per year. It is that possible??)
Q.5 “How many reports for antisocial behaviors have been made during last year, that happened on toilets, and how many toilets have been closed for antisocial behavior or vandalism?”

R: “We do not hold an accurate record of ASB incidents for the toilets however, three toilet blocks have been
permanently closed due repeat vandalism and misuse within the Parks”
(The council does not have any report for ASB, but 3 toilets have been closed for vandalism?? The data does not match).

The response has been provided in text, instead of using a spreadsheet format.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/f...

Yours faithfully,

Santino Pani