TUC Guide To Going To The Loo At Work Issued

Toilet breaks are not a luxury, but a basic human need, and employers who don’t provide staff with toilet facilities are breaking the law. That is the basic tenant behind the TUC's latest guide in supporting workers who are facing dickensian style management who believe that employees needing to go to the loo should do so in their own time. hence the increasing number of workers finding that their pay has been docked as a result of them having to visit the toilet during working time.

With the call centre industry first utilising punitive measures against their employees needing timer for a 'natural break' and even making people put their hand up before being allowed to the loo, UK businesses are increasingly making swinging deductions from their employees pay. Others plan work schedules that take no account of toilet breaks or allow a work culture to develop where use of the toilet whenever a worker requires it is frowned upon.

Indeed if many of them had their way, the picture on the left would be a common working practice.

Not being able to use the toilet when nature calls can cause real health problems warns the report. Conditions including digestive and urinary tract problems can develop into more serious health issues, and individuals on certain medications may need to go more often than usual. Personal hygiene plays a major role in preventing the spread of disease and the health of workers, and their families, is being put at risk as a result of employers’ unwillingness to comply with basic health and safety law.

Working in the cold can be another cause of more frequent loo use, and women who are menstruating, pregnant or menopausal need to take a trip to the toilet more often than they would normally. Similarly, call centre workers are encouraged to drink lots of water to limit the strain on their voices, but discouraged from taking too many toilet breaks, says the report.

TUC Deputy General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: "Employers shouldn't be mean and penny pinching over their employees’ need to use the loo. They should trust staff and let them take a few minutes away from their work if they need to go.

Dickensian attitudes to toilet breaks have no place in the modern workplace. Employees should be free to go to the toilet in work time, and not have to raise their hands for permission as if they were back in school, or have their employers keep notes on how long or how often they go for. And when staff do get the loo, they have the right to expect clean, well-ventilated facilities."

The guidance entitled, Give Us a (Loo) Break says better toilet facilities for UK employees will only come about if:

• the Health and Safety Executive and local authority inspectors ensure that employers are complying with their obligations under UK safety laws and are providing suitable, sufficient and accessible toilets and washing facilities that are clean, well ventilated, lit and stocked with soap and towels;
  
  
• the law is changed so that employees can go to the toilet whenever they need to – so long as they are not endangering the safety of their colleagues, and in work rather than their own time.

The guidance document can be downloaded from the E-Library Database in Word format - click on the pic!

Source: TUC / HR Review

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