Pissoirs cost £15,000 to maintain

Cornwall Council said pissoirs in Newquay would cost £6,000 a year to maintain, despite them being shut.

The three cylindrical urinals were installed in 2006 after the public toilets were closed because of heavy vandalism.

The pissoirs were also closed during the summer 2009 when the council decided it did not like the image they portrayed.

They would cost the council £15,000 to maintain even if they remained closed.

Brian Higman said local people would not be happy at the situation.

"When they've been reading in the press recently how tight the council's budget is, I should image people will be quite annoyed to think there's £15,000 going to be used for nothing."

Trial closure

The pissoirs were bought and installed by the former Restormel Borough Council.

The unitary authority Cornwall Council took the decision to close them as a trial to see if vandalism in the public toilets was still an issue.

It said the pissoirs were not liked by local people and did not help improve the reputation of the town.

The Head of Operational and Technical Services at Cornwall Council, Jerry Masters, said the maintenance contract on the pissoirs would run until 2012 at a cost of £15,000.

But he said the authority had three options - to sell the pissoirs back to the supplier, to leave them closed and pay the maintenance costs or to re-open them.

A decision was likely to be made early in 2010 after meetings with local people, tourism officials and the police