I was pleased to see Fermanagh and Omagh District Council move a step closer to helping support women facing period poverty this week, when it passed a motion to provide free sanitary products in council buildings and sports facilities. But my celebration was short-lived when I learned that a few councillors suggested women might abuse the scheme, and so they are to carry out a “feasibility” study before agreeing to its roll out.

I was even more saddened and frustrated when I read that one of those putting caveats on the initiative was a woman.

Anyone, but particularly any woman, who puts cost above another woman’s need to access free sanitary products really needs to take a long hard look at their priorities.

The discussion at the December meeting of councillors in Enniskillen last week suggested that “one difficulty in introducing the service will be ensuring that those for whom it is intended, those in real financial difficulty, can avail of the service and that it is not abused by those not in real need”.

I’d like to make a suggestion to councillors in Fermanagh and Omagh that any woman who finds herself bleeding in a public toilet without sanitary protection is in “real need”.

Furthermore, why do we think it’s acceptable for women, regardless of their socio-economic background, to pay for menstrual care at all?

Consider this: would those councillors who debated the issue last week also suggest a feasibility study on providing toilet roll or soap in council facilities?

For too long, society and successive governments have treated – and taxed – sanitary items as luxuries when in actual fact they are an essential part of health care.

In the UK, it’s estimated that the average woman spends around £150 a year on sanitary products. A survey by Plan International UK found that one in 10 women aged between 14 and 21 were unable to afford towels and tampons. Some miss school to forego embarrassment, others improvise with socks and toilet roll.

Where I live, there’s an initiative called the Red Box Project, which is aimed at ensuring no young woman goes without access to menstrual care. Using donations from people and businesses in the local community, the project provides red boxes filled with sanitary products and underwear to more than 800 schools throughout the UK.

What’s so important and valuable about The Red Box project is that it does not discriminate. There are no questions as to why people need to use the boxes; rather, it believes all women deserve equal access to period products, whatever their situation.

Frankly, I don’t believe anyone has the right to make a judgement about whether a woman on her period deserves a free tampon, whether it’s from a football stadium, a shopping centre or school. Money shouldn’t even come into it because women deserve these products regardless of their financial position. And aside from this fact, I’m quite certain that the women who can afford to buy their own sanitary products won’t be nipping into council buildings or sports centres in Tyrone and Fermanagh on their lunch break to “abuse the system” by stocking up on free sanitary pads. I admit to being facetious here but I find it ridiculous to suggest this kind of initiative could be open to the abuse feared by local councillors. Why can’t we all just trust women?

In 1986, when Gloria Steinem wrote a wry essay considering what the world would look like if men got periods, she suggested that they “would brag about how long and how much” and said that menstrual supplies would be “federally funded and free”. When you look closely at the issue of period poverty, it cannot be seen merely along class lines but as another example of a society still so full of gender inequality.

In my view, councils shouldn’t be wasting time and money carrying out feasibility studies on the provision of items that are essential to women. Feminine hygiene is a health issue and the government should be funding free access to period products for all women, whether they are experiencing poverty or not.