CALLS have erupted again for Newport’s chartist mural to be saved from demolition with more than 1,300 people signing a petition for it to be preserved.

But the campaign, which has attracted national media coverage, has been derided by a city MP, who said it implied the city was indifferent to its Chartist heritage.

The man behind the petition, Peter Rawcliffe, compared its demolition to removing a war memorial.

In March 2012, and following a public consultation, Newport council decided to recreate the mural in Newport Central Library.

The mural depicts the uprising of 1839 which ended in bloodshed outside the Westgate Hotel.

There had been protests over a proposed demolition in 2007, but the mural was given a reprieve after the last redevelopment project fell through.

By yesterday 1,358 people had signed the petition on Change.org, which said the mural offers a unique insight to the history of the city, as well as celebrating the democracy won by the people of Wales and Britain.

Petition organiser Peter Rawcliffe, who lives in Pontypool but has worked in Maindee for more than 20 years, said it was an “exceptional piece of art”.

“I don’t think people realise what they are losing,” he said, calling for a dialogue so that plans can be changed and the mural can remain intact.

“If this is removed it is like removing a war memorial.”

Newport West MP Paul Flynn said campaigners were suggesting “Newport is indifferent to its history, which is untrue”.

He said the city had the greatest regard to the history of Chartism.

Mr Flynn added: “I think their case is confused and incoherent and is damaging to the city.”

Mr Rawcliffe told the Argus said that he didn’t know anyone in the campaign who had said Newport didn’t care about Chartism.

Built in 1978, the mural is 35- metres long and is made up of more than 200,000 pieces of tile and Venetian smalti.

A Newport council spokeswoman said: “The cost of moving the mural is not economically viable, and a number of alternative options were considered.

“The proposal, which was to create a replica on the wall of the museum and library, received the most support and was also the one favoured by the artist’s own son, who owns the copyright to the work.”

ARGUS COMMENT: Library plan a good one

THE threat to Newport’s Chartist mural is more than six years old.

The mural, in a subway off John Frost Square, has been in place since 1978 and depicts the uprising of 1839 which ended with Chartists being shot and killed by troops outside the Westgate Hotel.

The mural is earmarked for demolition when the city centre’s long-awaited Friars Walk shopping development is built. That has been the case since 2007.

Nowthe issue has hit the headlines again following national newspaper and radio interest in a campaign to save the mural and a somewhat unseemly social media spat between Newport WestMP Paul Flynn and protesters.

Mr Flynn has dismissed the campaign as ‘not serious’ and suggested some names on a petition signed by more than 1,300 people were ‘dodgy’. The claims are denied by campaigners.

What surprises us is that this latest war of rhetoric appears to ignore the fact that the city council plans to recreate the mural and display it in the city’s central library. The plan has the approval of the family of Kenneth Budd, the original artist.

Surely that is better than previous proposals to destroy the mural but not replace it?

Chartist history is important to Newport and, in an ideal world, it would be better to retain the existing mural.

But at what cost – and would the city’s council tax payers be willing to foot the bill?