Graham Carter - the voice of age and experience

TOILETS is a debate I don’t often get bogged down in.

But I am afraid I must bring it up after visiting a restaurant in Bournemouth recently.

We had a tasty meal, and before the drive home I thought it would be wise to visit the men’s room.

Before I got there, however, I was intercepted by my son, who thought I needed a word in my ear.

The men’s room, he said, wasn’t the men’s room. It was unisex.

I must have looked pretty concerned by this revelation because he had to quickly reassure me that there were cubicles inside, but otherwise it was mixed.

Now, I didn’t want to pooh-pooh the idea without debating it or at least going through the motions, but my instincts told me the idea stank.

Sure enough, when I got in there, a lady was washing her hands at a sink, which instantly made the situation awkward, probably for both of us, and I have to admit that I was reluctant to emerge from my cubicle to wash my hands, too, until I had heard her leave.

My fellow diners were intrigued to hear about the radical toilet arrangements, and the female ones were, for some reason, the most curious to have a look, even though they didn’t have a pressing need to visit.

My wife returned to report that while she was in there, a couple had come in together, almost hand-in-hand.

Perhaps they were regulars who had had more time to get used to the concept, but I don’t think I would ever get to the point where I would want to visit the toilet with anybody I know.

This wasn’t the restaurant’s only break with sense and sensibility. It is also one of those where the manager has decided to do away with proper plates and replace them with lumps of wood.

Don’t ask me why. That’s how they used to serve up slop in the workhouse.

Most of us have visited places where this ridiculous idea has been employed in the mistaken belief that it’s somehow fun and trendy, but if you ask me it is another ‘solution’ that has no problem, and I look forward to such nonsense being flushed down the toilet soon, unisex or otherwise.

Sometimes the modern world seems addicted to change for change’s sake, as if the short attention span that the broadcasters and advertisers and politicians give us credit for is a reality after all.

Look at sport. Football is the sporting equivalent of unisex toilets because they took something that was fit for purpose, and which was even exciting, entertaining and fascinating, and then changed almost everything about it, destroying all of its charm in the process.

Judging by all this and because I am in my mid-50s, you could be excused for thinking I have become stuck in my ways, but I am actually the kind of person who readily embraces change, as long as there is a good reason for it.

Indeed, I get just as annoyed about things that are done a particular way for no other reason than that’s the way they have always been done, regardless of whether it is still relevant, logical, right or fair. We are reminded of this every year during Wimbledon Fortnight, thanks to the outdated rules of tennis, and specifically serving. It’s the only sport I can think of where players, even including overpaid professionals, are allowed a second chance after doing something wrong. And this needs to change.

Only in this column could you go off to the toilet and end up on Centre Court.