Our vision
Bathroom Breaks
This paper highlights the issues with the rules around bathroom breaks in schools. In some schools, students are restricted or even banned from using toilets during lessons. This can lead to students bleeding through if they are on their periods, wetting themselves, and harming their health by delaying going to the toilet. This is backwards and simply shouldn’t be happening in a modern school system. It’s time the law on bathroom breaks changed to ensure students in every part of the UK have access to toilets during lessons.
Bathroom Breaks: Allowing students to use the toilets during lessons
Quick summary
- In the UK, teachers can stop students from using the toilet and there are multiple incidents where this power has led to students bleeding through clothes when they are on their periods or wetting themselves.
- Neither common sense policies nor full bans on students going to the toilet have failed to work.
- All students should be allowed to use the toilets during lessons and alongside this rule, we support a complaints system Ofsted so students can raise complaints about teachers if needed.
Authors
Jasneet Samrai
Deputy Director (External)
Jasneet works at the Royal College of Physicians and has previously held roles at Breast Cancer Now and Oxfam. They also worked as a campaign organiser, helping to elect three MEPs. Jasneet currently serves as Head of Pastoral Care.
Foreword
Monica Lennon
Member of the Scottish Parliament
Monica Lennon, Scottish Labour and Co-operative Member of the Scottish Parliament for Central Scotland.
Supporters
Baroness Katy Clark
Member of the Scottish Parliament
Katy is the Scottish Parliament Member for the West Scotland region. She is also is a former Member of Parliament and a former Member of House of Lords.
Collette Stevenson
Member of the Scottish Parliament
Collette is the SNP Member of the Scottish Parliament for East Kilbride.
Paul Sweeney
Member of the Scottish Parliament
Paul is the Labour and Co-operative Party Member of the Scottish Parliament for Glasgow Region. He was previously the MP for Glasgow North East.
Programme partners
Our programme partners share our broad campaign goals and work with us on the campaign. They also bring in expertise and help to advise us on the campaign.
ERIC: the Children’s Bowel and Bladder Charity
The British Toilet Association
Coverage
Ben Prater interviews Jasneet Samrai on Bathroom Breaks
Free Market Conservatives: The outdated rules on bathroom breaks in schools are in dire need of reform
Ben Prater interviews Jasneet Samrai on Bathroom Breaks
Free Market Conservatives: The outdated rules on bathroom breaks in schools are in dire need of reform
Your questions answered
School policies on students using toilets vary across the UK. However, nationally around 8% of teachers already work in schools where students can use the toilets during lessons as a right. There are also individual schools where we know students can use toilets when they need to such as in Cotham School which we spoke to during this research. Allowing students to use toilets during lessons is not only workable but already used across the UK.
Some schools give passes to students with health conditions where there is a known need for using the toilet. The issue with this policy is that students who need them may not be given a pass and anyone may need the toilet during a lesson unexpectedly. This can range from having a heavy period, undiagnosed health conditions to just needing to use the toilet. A system that relies on passes simply can't account for all of these cases and there have been multiple instances where it hasn't.
We know that underfunding has had a negative impact on both school budgets and individual members of staff. This can mean larger class sizes and fewer resources. However, these issues aren't the sole cause of students being unable to use toilets during lessons. After all, the schools implementing restrictive policies on school toilets are a mix of well funded, under funded, state, grammar and private schools. That means that whilst we support extra funding for teachers and schools extra funding wouldn't solve the issue of students being unable to access toilets during lessons. It will require a change in the rules to ensure this actually happens.
Restricting access to toilets can cause pupils to misbehave. It may make them more disruptive if they are unable to use the toilets or are in pain during lessons. Being unable to use toilets during lessons can also cause health issues in the long term.
There are concerns students may use toilet breaks to misbehave, vape or run away from lessons. The reasons behind students misbehaving are often complex and are not solved by preventing them from using toilets during lessons, it may even make them worse. These issues can be solved with teachers seeking to students who use toilets regularly and keeping a record of students who are currently using the toilets. It's also the case that stopping students from using the toilet during lessons can simply shift the issue to another time. These same problems can occur during lunch, at break times, before school or after.
There are already plenty of schools which have already implemented this policy so this has already been achieved. There are, however, a number of extra steps that can also be taken when trying to safeguard pupils. These include teachers being able to check students in and out of the classroom when they go to use the toilets to ensure they return. Second, we want any government implementing a wider policy around bathroom breaks during lessons to survey schools which already use this policy to understand how they keep pupils safe. Finally, we also support extra funding for schools to ensure a member of staff can monitor toilets during lesson times.