A CHARITABLE trust is hoping the Government will help protect Swindon's crumbling Mechanics' Institute from another winter of decay.

Martha Parry and other campaigners from the Mechanics' Institution Preservation Trust believe that Swindon Council cannot see the benefits of restoring the 148-year-old grade II Star listed building.

Now they will ask Swindon MPs Michael Wills and Julia Drown to lobby for Urgent Works status in a campaign entitled Not Another Winter.

Urgent Works status would see the protective work needed to ensure the building does not have to endure its 17th winter of dereliction.

On Wednesday night council leader Sue Bates and her cabinet refused to fund work on the Emlyn Square building until officers had undertaken a risk assessment.

The report, to be tabled within six weeks, will detail exactly what the financial risk to the council in undertaking the works would be.

But Ms Parry said that if any risk assessment was needed it should have been done during the past five months.

Coun Bates (Lab, Gorse Hill and Pinehurst) claimed that even if the building's owners, Mountmead, were billed for the work the council may be left to pay costs totalling £250,000.

In the meantime a task force, chaired by English Heritage chairman and former council employee Sir Neil Cossons, is being set up to establish the long-term prospects for the building.

Ms Parry said: "I'm really enthusiastic to get on with the task force, but I'm disappointed that the council doesn't share our optimism for the beneficial uses the building could be put to.

"We need to get this Urgent Works status completed by November to ensure the building has short-term protection.

"Its has endured 16 winters like that and for every year that goes by the cost is just going to be greater and the damage more serious.

"It would also protect children from entering the building and putting themselves at risk.

"The Mechanics' Institute is a grand old building with so much character and so much to offer the town. We don't want money from the council, just their support in planning terms.

"We can't put pressure on Mountmead to carry out work on the building, but the council can." Ms Parry painted a grand image of what the Mechanics' Institute could be like if permission to renovate the building was granted.

She said it could become a "community crossroads" where community, voluntary and youth groups could base themselves.

There are also ambitious plans to re-open a theatre and create a conference and live music venue in the building. The group hopes that lottery grants and some £2m from fundraising would cover the cost of its plans.