A campaign has been launched to save the toilets at Minions on Bodmin Moor from closure.

More than 600 people, many of them visitors, have signed a petition launched by resident Nick Fisher at the end of last month, in a bid to persuade Cornwall Council to change its mind.

If Linkinhorne Parish Council is unwilling to take over the toilets, which caters for the thousands of visitors to the moorland World Heritage site each year, they will close at the end of July as part of Cornwall Council's cost cutting.

Mr Fisher said: 'We get visitors all year round and in the summer both car parks are nearly always full. If the toilets are closed there will be unsanitary consequences. I know schools are writing to Cornwall Council, as a health and safety requirement for school trips is that toilet facilities are available.

Parish councillor Beryl Martin said her observations from living on the moor near to the Mining Heritage Centre, owned by Cornwall Council, is that Minions is visited 'by the world and his wife'.

'Thousands come here every year, not just from the local area, but from all over the world,' she said. 'In the English Heritage book on Bodmin Moor, the Minions area is listed as having a landscape of international importance.'

She said it was unfair to expect a small parish like Linkinhorne to fund the toilets in a busy tourist area. 'It would cost about £6,000 a year which is half the council's budget, and we have already taken on the toilets in Upton Cross,' she said. 'If Cornwall Council, which has just spent money on the toilets, goes ahead and closes them, it will mean dogs, which have two bins, will have better facilities than humans.'

The owner of The Hurlers Halt tearooms, Tony Symons, said it was unreasonable for Cornwall Council to expect his business and The Cheesewring pub to supply toilets for coachloads of visitors.

'When I contacted Cornwall Council to register my complaint the person on the end of the line said: "Where's Minions?"

'I told the council it will cost them a lot more to send cleansing services to the moors than to keep the toilets open.'

In a statement Cornwall Council said: 'We have agreed to keep the facilities at Minions open to the end of July to give the parish council three months post election to review if they will take over the running of the toilets.'

When asked by the Cornish Times about the closure of the toilets at Golitho Falls at Draynes Woods, the council said: 'St Neot Parish Council is exploring options to see how they could best achieve getting them re-opened.'

A spokesperson for St Neot said they were considering putting the situation before English Heritage and other agencies but they did not have the finance to run the toilets as they had already taken over the facility in St Neot village.