New 20p charge to use public toilets in Ludlow
Public toilets in Ludlow town centre are to start charging, as the town council seeks to meet the cost of keeping them open.
Councillors voted to start imposing a 20p charge in the near future for the toilets off Ludlow's Castle Square, next to the Castle Street Car Park.
Vivienne Parry, Shropshire councillor for Ludlow South, said: "The town council may well have to refurbish the toilets in the next few years and we think it shouldn't be the taxpayers who have to pay to have that done, it should be the visitors who use them.
"We voted for there to be a 20p charge to use the toilets, we'll do it for 12 months and then review it.
"The toilets are costing us a lot of money to run at the moment. We do get a lot of tourists and to keep the toilets clean is a lot of work.
"It costs £36,000 a year to run them, what with cleaning, water rates, electricity and money spent on toilet rolls and so on, and we really haven't got any money coming in to cover that at all. We're not getting any money from the government any more."
"To keep them spick and span we need people to pay," she added.
