I was at Ion Orchard on July 29 and wanted to use the toilet for the handicapped, as my five-year-old special-needs daughter had soiled herself.

We waited for five minutes. Then, an elderly male cleaner saw us waiting, pointed to the "occupied" signal on the electronic panel and casually walked away.

We began knocking on the toilet door but there was no response. We waited another 20 minutes until we encountered a female cleaner who obtained the key from another staff member and unlocked the toilet for us.

It was clear that the cleaners had locked the toilet so that people do not use it, perhaps to spare them the labour of cleaning it.

What if a wheelchair-bound person had needed to use the toilet? Would he or she be denied access to the toilet too?

Tan Toh Peng