A NATIONAL newspaper has urged people to speak up for Swindon.

The Guardian the broadsheet daily known principally for appealing to a middle class or intellectual market has claimed "there are a lot places far worse."

The newspaper dedicated a section of its leader column to Swindon yesterday, following the news first revealed in the Advertiser last Saturday that conservation charity the National Trust will base its new central office in Swindon.

The Evening Advertiser sent an open letter to the staff earlier this year after reports that employees were reluctant to relocate to Swindon.

The Guardian article draws comparisons between Swindon and Basingstoke in "the list of English towns which everyone sneers at."

It claims Swindon is short on culture, but is home to a plentiful selection of places to visit.

It states: "Swindon is used to such buffeting. As the creators of modern Swindon feared, it is short on culture. And yet even the fastidious should find plenty which pleases here."

Among the delights the newspaper says await the visitor are Lydiard House. It also claims Swindon is situated close to "a crop of good towns such as Malmesbury and Marlborough, and the sort of agreeable up-market villages where National Trust relocatees might be pleased to live: Aldbourne, Ramsbury and the delectable hamlets which decorate the sublime Vale of Pewsey."

The columnist adds: "Like Swindon, the trust, as its new director is well aware, has its image problems. If it has landed itself with something of a reputation for prissiness, this kind of judgment on Swindon helps explain it. Swindon may not be Florence, but people who cannot imagine worse places have plainly led excessively sheltered lives."

The National Trust's move to a new HQ is set to take place during 2003/4 and the search for a permanent site or building in the town is underway.

Matt Holland, a leading figure in Swindon's cultural scene, also defended the town against its detractors. He said today: "I find there are not enough nights in the week."

Mr Holland, director of the prestigious annual Swindon Festival of Literature, cited everything from sports facilities to theatre, cinema and the work of Old Town-based Arts Centre.

He added: "And if you don't like what's in the town, there is plenty to do just outside it.

"There are no problems with Swindon. I think many of the critics are people who are in a perpetual search for excite-ment, and who confuse culture with entertainment of the alcoholic variety."