TOM UTLEY: It’s an Englishman’s inalienable right to enjoy a discreet alfresco pee in the countryside – without being fined for ‘littering’ by a council snooper

Don’t tell Mrs. U, but I often sneak into the darkness of the garden after she goes to bed and relieve myself behind her lovingly tended bushes in a corner where no one can see me. Well, it doesn’t seem to hurt her plants.

I have also been known to sneak behind a tree on the ordinary road, when nature’s call becomes too urgent to resist when walking the dog – although I hasten to say I go to great lengths (often literally ) to look for a place in the woods where there can be no witnesses. I would indeed hate it if anyone saw me.

My excuse is that, like so many men of a certain age – the King comes to mind – I suffer from prostate problems. This means that I can no longer take pride in my cast iron bladder, as I did in my youth, when I could drink a brewery dry without ever needing the gents.

Now that I’m seventy, nature calls much more often – and when it does, it really screams.

But I must admit that I get a special kind of guilty pleasure from peeing outside. Perhaps only men will fully understand what I mean, because we are so much better equipped than the fairer sex to do it without hassle.

It’s certainly a lot more pleasant than a visit to the average public toilet (in the increasingly unlikely event that a toilet can be found, smelly or not, when we need one).

Doing it in the open air gives me an atavistic sense of freedom, a sense of being at one with nature, which probably goes back to the origins of our species. It may be that our ancient ancestors marked their territory in this way, as dogs do today – but I’m no David Attenborough, so don’t quote me there.

Before I go an inch further, I should make it clear that I carry no torch for those disgusting beasts – mostly drunk men – who urinate on sidewalks, in store doors, or in the elevators or concrete stairwells of apartment buildings, making their lives a make hell. others with the stench and misery they cause.

But I feel very strongly that citizens of a free country – of both sexes – should be allowed to relieve themselves discreetly in the countryside, or in a green space owned by the government, where there is no serious there is a risk of being seen, or of committing olfactory insults.

For all these reasons, I felt a wave of sympathy this week when I read about Michael Mason, who, like me, suffers from a dodgy prostate gland.

He was one of two men fined £88 for ‘littering’ after being caught by a company employed by Dacorum Town Council (yes, that’s really the name!) while relieving himself in a parking space in Hertfordshire, a two-hour journey after 45 minutes.

According to the account he gave to BBC News: ‘I made sure no one could see me and was very, very discreet.’

But this does not seem to have cut any ice with the enforcer who imposed the fine. Rules are rules, after all, and the municipality of Dacorum apparently defines urination as ‘litter’, even if it happens on the grass behind a tree in a parking space.

Leave aside the mystery of how the Jobsworth in question manages to live with himself – although I wonder what he says to his children, if he has any, when they ask him, ‘What do you do for the council, Dad?’

Presumably he should answer, “Well, I lurk in parking lots so I can spy on drivers and fine them when they stop.”

What amazes me even more is how the council can seriously describe Mr Mason’s alleged offense as littering.

I’m not the only one who has doubts on this point either. The lawyer who advised the council on this point now says that his guidelines have been incorrectly applied.

While sticking to his definition of urination as littering, David Armstrong says, if it is done on the public street, ‘To be littering it must be capable of causing or leading to pollution, and must also be left behind . Both can be very difficult to prove provably. If disputed, both must be proven.”

In fairness to Dacorum council, the spokesperson said that after considering factors such as the location of the offense and the reasons given for it, some penalties have been rescinded.

It is not clear from the reports I have read whether Mr Mason’s fine is included or not. But even if so, this hardly compensates for the humiliation he suffered, or the bureaucratic palaver he must have endured to appeal.

Whatever the truth, Decorum’s crackdown on outdoor urination appears to have strong public support. It comes mainly from women, which does not surprise me, although they must admit that many of their own sex – especially expectant mothers, menopausal women and those who have experienced multiple births – are occasionally forced to crouch behind a bush .

Even Baroness Warsi, the Tory who was Britain’s first Muslim cabinet minister, admitted this morning that she has reached a certain age where ‘if you go for a five-hour walk you can’t last. I often had a joke in the woods.’

As for those in favor of a nationwide ban, some angrily claim that urine is seeping into waterways, causing pollution and harming wildlife. But they must have noticed that humans are not the only beings who make these kinds of things public.

Do they think dogs, foxes, cows, sheep, horses and pigs should all wear diapers or relieve themselves in toilets specially designed for them?

Others express horror at the thought that people who empty their bladders in the absence of facilities are unable to wash their hands afterwards.

At this point I fear I will offend many readers if I say that my late mother taught me that while women should always wash their hands after urinating, it was “normal” for a man to do so (and that he meant they don’t). ‘common’ or ‘widespread’, I’m sorry to say).

I always thought she invented this arcane etiquette rule herself. That was until a friend told me about a famous gentleman’s swap between Bobby Robson, when he was manager of Ipswich Town, and the club’s then chairman, Johnny Cobbold, a grandson of the Duke of Devonshire.

When Cobbold walked to the door without stopping at the sink, Robson chastised him, saying, “Where I come from, we’re taught to wash our hands after peeing.”

“Bobby, where I grew up,” Cobbold replied, “we learned not to piss on our hands in the first place!”

These days I wash my hands – not for false hygienic reasons, but just because of the dirty looks thrown my way during the time I followed my mother’s advice. But of course that is not possible in the forest.

As for my nightly forays into the garden, they started when Mrs. U had my increasingly needed downstairs toilet demolished in her megalomaniac drive to expand her kitchen empire. Now it’s the garden in the evening, or another trudge upstairs. No contest, I guess.

But doesn’t the London Wildlife Trust assure us that male human urine (although, interestingly, not the female variety) is a very effective means of keeping foxes away?

Okay, it doesn’t seem to be working very well as our garden is constantly overrun by foxes. In fact, they drive our poor dog into a fit of rage by yapping at them as they stare at her from the roof of the barn with languid contempt.

But if Mrs. U ever catches me in the act, so to speak, I can always insist that I try to protect her beloved garden from unwanted intruders.

As for the merciless male councilors and officers of Dacorum, can any one of them lay his hand on his heart and swear that he has never sinned as I have?

If so, all I can say is that they can hardly call themselves human – and they’re missing out on a treat.