BRIDPORT Town Council would have to find £20k a year to take over the redundant toilet block in East Street.

And that figure does not include the cost of buying or renovating the building.

Last night Bridport councillors on the finance and general purposes committee were due to discuss a proposal to bid for the block, which has a guide price of £30,000, at auction on October 10.

West Dorset District Council is selling the building after scrapping its plan to demolish it and build two three-bedroomed homes.

In a report to the meeting, town clerk Bob Gillis says councillors need to consider the purchase price might be higher than £30,000, toilets could cost £20,000 a year and money would need to be found for renovation. Mr Gillis suggests there are other ways to provide toilets in the town – one of which is a community toilet scheme the district council proposed in Dorchester in 2012.

Introducing the idea in Bridport would need the co-operation of food and drink premises to allow their toilets to be used by the public, he says.

However, the idea of opening their establishments to the public does not sit too comfortably with many town centre businesses.

Wetherspoon spokesman Eddie Gershon said: “Towns are much better off with public loos, since not everybody likes to go into pubs.

“A scheme like this can cause problems for licence holders of supervision, fear of drug use and many other issues, so this burden should not be added to the already existing responsibilities of the pub licensee.

“In essence if an individual requests to use the pub toilets the member of staff is likely to give permission. However, we would not want a situation where the pub was part of a community toilet scheme, in effect open to everybody to use without eating or drinking in the pub itself.”

Mervyn Ashford of the Beach and Barnicott said: “The council should maintain the East Street toilets as another facility in town.”

Billy Lintell, marketing manager at The Bull Hotel said the impact on the business would be too great.

“We have only two toilets, which is only just sufficient for our restaurant and two bars and often have whole hotel book-outs for weddings and private parties, so it would be completely inappropriate to have random members of the public wandering through.

“I feel that The Bull, along with a lot of other business’ in Bridport, pay a huge amount of money in rates to the council. Surely it is their responsibility to provide adequate facilities with this revenue?

“Bridport is a very popular tourist destination for which The Bull plays a part in, and it would be tragic to jeopardise future visitors due to lack of conveniences.”

A spokesman for West Dorset District Council said the pilot community toilet schemes had not gone ahead in Dorchester.