FURTHER to S Zapello's letter, The Argus, Friday, October 21, highlighting the scandal of many city public toilets closed over the winter, the previous day I had asked Green council leader Phelim Mac Cafferty about this very issue in a public question at the full council meeting.

Essentially my question was why Brighton and Hove City Council were recruiting a new well paid head of communications and public relations if the city couldn't afford to keep public toilets open during the winter, and during a "hiring freeze"?

Naturally I received no sensible answer as to why it was more important to recruit a post which none of us would be any the wiser if they weren't there than keeping essential public services open.

Cllr Mac Cafferty also got the size of his own council communications team wrong, having had five days to research his answer to my pre-submitted public question, and cited 12 staff, when the job application claimed the new post holder would be in charge of 25.

So essential is the council communications team to the running of the council he didn't even know what size it was.

Meanwhile we have a Green and Labour coalition which has declared itself a City of Sanctuary - from toilets, it would seem.

Which begs the question; where are our substantial homeless population expected to relieve themselves, never mind our many day trippers and council tax paying citizens?

Brighton and Hove will soon become the resort of last resort if council over-staffing extravagances and non-evidence backed social science experiments on us such as unused cycle lanes trump providing the absolute statutory basics our council are obliged to provide.

One of the new head of communications and public relations' duties will be "anti-racism". In which case let's hope they tackle the all-races human rights issue of insufficient public toilets.

Laura King

On behalf of Friends of Brighton and Hove Citizens' Action Group