North Ayrshire Council's schools toilets have become the first recipients of a new award

The council - and the young people they say are ‘at the heart’ of the work - were awarded Scotland’s first ‘Flushed for Success’ award.

The award was presented by the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland, Tam Baillie, who has pushed for better toilets in schools across Scotland for a number of years.

He launched the ‘Flushed with Success’ campaign in 2013, after a poll of more than 2,000 high school pupils across Scotland found that almost half of students used their school toilets only when absolutely necessary.

And an astonishing 10 per cent never used them at all, because of their poor standards.

North Ayrshire Council has now set the benchmark for the way they have engaged and consulted with young people to provide the best facilities available.

The Youth Council and the Pupil Reference Group have been heavily involved and helped establish a standard specification for improving the design and a policy that provides common guidelines for the management of toilets across North Ayrshire schools.

After collecting the award on Friday, Councillor Ruth Maguire, North Ayrshire’s Youth Champion, said: “This is real recognition of all the hard work undertaken by the young people across North Ayrshire.

“It is a real honour to be in the privileged position of North Ayrshire’s Youth Champion - especially on days like this when our young people’s outstanding work is recognised nationally.

“It’s also testament to everyone involved within Youth Services and the Education team.”

Councillor Maguire added: “They didn’t pay lip-service to the young people, they listened, learned and took their views and opinions on board and made the necessary changes.”