Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk reverses decision on unisex toilets at Fortitude Valley State Secondary College
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has waded in on a plan to install gender-neutral toilets at Brisbane’s newest high school.
Education
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CHILDREN at Brisbane’s newest high school will no longer share gender-neutral bathrooms after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk killed off the plan.
The Sunday-Mail revealed last month that Fortitude Valley State Secondary College was set to install unisex facilities across its entire $80 million campus to become the first Queensland high school with shared bathrooms.
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But the plan – slammed by child experts – has been overturned by the Premier, who insisted boys and girls should have their own private spaces.
Self-contained cubicles with hand basins were to be used by 250 Year 7 students starting in a few week’s time, while the seven-storey St Paul’s Terrace precinct was to be fitted with gender-neutral cubicles and shared basin areas in time for its opening later this year.
The only exception was to be two male and female toilets in change room facilities.
Education Minister Grace Grace confirmed a change to that plan had since been made.
“All necessary arrangements have been completed to ensure the new Fortitude Valley State Secondary College is ready for the start of school,” she said.
“This includes a change to make separate, gender-specific toilets for boys and girls available. “There are also specific toilets for students with a disability.
“Separate boys and girls change rooms with toilets had already been factored into the design of the school.”
Ms Palaszczuk cut down the plan when publicly confronted with it following The Sunday-Mail’s story, promising to raise it with the Education Department.
“I will be making it very clear that you should have toilets for boys and girls,” she said at the time.
The vertical high school will be the first school to be opened in the inner city in more than 50 years and is being delivered in conjunction with the Queensland University of Technology.
It’s expected to have a student population of 1500 across all year levels by the time its first student cohort graduates in 2025.
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