Updated requirements for Changing Places in Northern Ireland
Last month, Northern Ireland’s Finance Minister Conor Murphy announced an update to the statutory guidance requirements for Changing Places toilets. Amendments Booklet – AMD 8 (2022) will provide further guidance to Technical Booklet R (2012) which covers access to and use of buildings within Northern Ireland and come into effect on the 30th of June 2022.
These updates follow new rules in England which would require new public buildings install Changing Place effective from 2021, along with a £30 million fund to facilitate the installation of changing places across England in March of 2021.
The new amendments to Northern Ireland’s guidance will now require Changing Place toilets be provided within certain buildings used by the general public as follows:
• Assembly, entertainment and recreation building with a capacity of 350 or more people
• Shopping centres/malls, or retail parks with a gross floor area of 30,000m2 or more
• Retail premises with a gross floor area of 2,500m2 or more
• Leisure and sports buildings with a gross floor area of 5,000m2 or more
• Hospitals and primary care centres
• Cemetery and crematorium buildings
Updates to Technical Booklet R are expected to not only improve accessibility of the built environments, but also provide opportunities for mobility and access firms supplying changing place equipment.
In a statement, Minister Murphy said “This is a very important step for inclusion and equality. Increasing the number of Changing Places toilets will help make our public places more accessible and will make a huge difference to the lives of disabled people, their carers and their families.”
For more information on Amendments Booklet – AMD 8 (2022), click here
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