PUBLIC toilets will close next week following a funding row between councillors.

Lyme Regis Town Council had offered the Woodmead Halls management committee £15,700 a year to continue running the public toilets – but the offer was labelled “a joke”.

The current service level agreement (SLA) for the Woodmead Halls toilets of £25,200 per year is due to expire at the end of March and the toilets will be closed.

Last year, a row erupted after it emerged the SLA had been funded from the grants pot of funding.

No money had been set aside for the town council’s budget next year and any funding agreement would have to be drawn from the budget surplus.

Cllr Brian Larcombe spoke out in favour of the council establishing another SLA with the committee, describing it as “a better approach”.

Cllr Stan Williams, also chairman of the Woodmead Halls management committee spoke out in praise of the work the caretaker Cllr Michaela Ellis, who is also deputy mayor, carries out.

He also hit out at changes made by a group of councillors who sat on the last council, before all standing down last May - dubbed the ‘gang of six’.

Cllr Williams said: “Michaela does the most magnificent job but we cannot expect her to do seven days of the week, every week of the year. It worked perfectly before the gang of six came in.”

The town council agreed to offer £15,700 to the halls’ management committee after receiving a request of £19,926 from the vice chairman of the committee.

Cllr Williams said: “This is a joke. We are not going to ask my caretaker to do much more work.

“I will not do it.”

After the committee was approached with the revised offer, Cllr Williams confirmed it had been rejected.

He said: “We have been trying to negotiate with them and we even offered to keep the toilets open for another two months while it was discussed – but they were not interested in that.

“We are very sad and upset about it. There is no way it can be run for such a little amount of money.

“We believe this is a huge blow to the town and we are extremely disappointed with the outcome.”