As someone who’s had a keen interest in public toilets for as long as I can remember, I just had to watch the video recorded by Singaporean toilet hygiene guru and World Toilet Association/World Toilet Day founder Jack Sim, in which he talks about his many achievements in several countries while criticising his own National Environment Agency for – as far as I can pick up, virtually ostracising him these days. Digging deeper, I discovered that there’s an issue over a Government initiative to publicly fund privately-owned coffee shops to improve conditions, whereas - reports Jack - everyone else has had to fund the work themselves. The video, which I found on YouTube courtesy of ‘Inconvenient Questions’, has apparently gone viral on social media since it was first shared last month and it’s definitely sparking controversial debate, which I won’t go into here. 

  

As Jack says in the video, he’s been working for free for 27 years to improve public toilets – and not just in Singapore. In China, his efforts have resulted in massive improvements over the past 20 years, in India, he promoted the introduction of 110 million new toilets, in Brazil he raised funds that helped privatise sewage provision which massively improved hygiene provision for ordinary people, and he’s also spearheaded improvements in Africa and Indonesia. That’s quite an achievement, don’t you think? 

  

Jack argues that stricter enforcement - not subsidies – is the way to go if Singapore is to continue to see improvements everywhere. He believes that the answer lies in greater numbers of surprise inspections carried out, along with stronger penalties for those flouting regulations. He also advocates greater use of technology, such as IoT sensors and QR feedback codes, along with the naming and shaming of unhygienic outlets - plus making cleanliness training mandatory for staff. 

One thing that’s not been mentioned in any of the related articles/comments I’ve read over the past couple of days, is ‘education’. I know from the Singaporean Toilet Association newsletters I’ve received for decades now that this is a big thing in that neck of the woods and I’ve long argued that we could do with lots more of it here, where growing numbers of people reckon it’s perfectly OK to leave chaos in their wake since somebody else will at some stage be forced to clean it up. As one comment on one of the threads reads: “You can take the person out of the uncivilised location but not the uncivilised behaviour out of the person.” A great observation! And that’s the thing I believe we should all be working on – our behaviour… our attitude… respect for others and our environment… Get that right and everything else becomes so much easier for everyone following in our wake. 

  

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