LAST week I read an article in this paper about a sort of last-ditch attempt to salvage the Chartist mural in the city centre. I am flabbergasted by all the rubbish (in my view) spoken by all the people who advocate its removal, and that includes all the local councillors, who wouldn’t know intellect if it smacked them full in the face. I spent 40 years in the Architect department for Newport Borough Council, designing many of their buildings, and I consistently met with a great deal of extremely bad taste and ridiculous proposals when creating my designs. Working with some councillors was always extremely testing to say the least. I haven’t seen the proposals for the new development, but in my view, any architect worth his salt could incorporate the wall containing the mural into any proposed design for the new centre. It would just take some adjustment to the design, but of course, when dealing with local councillors nothing counts that may be of value and worth keeping.

If anybody wants to challenge me in this context then get me a copy of the city centre proposals and I will show you how to save the murals in situ without any nonsense like moving them or copying them.

Brian Keen Brynhyfryd Road Newport