ONE of the many useful things the Victorians did for us was to promote the provision of public toilets in towns and cities.

In 21st century austerity Britain, however, many loos are closing and Poole shut two of its own WCs yesterday.

The areas concerned will instead have a “community toilet scheme”, with some businesses displaying “use our loo” stickers.

But many of those businesses will be long closed when people are making their way home at night full of beer.

It remains to be seen whether this new policy will turn out to be severely inconvenient.