THE most prestigious cultural event in Swindon has been left off a council web-site devoted to the town's city status bid.

Swindon Festival of Literature director Matt Holland was left bemused after trying to look the annual event up on the site.

Typing in "literature festival" drew a blank, as did "literature" or "cul-ture".

Swindon's current bid for city status is its second the last failed for, among other reasons, over-emphasis on materialism and the busi-ness world.

The council blames a glitch for the omission of the festival from its current city status web page.

Mr Holland said: "I would write a poem or a polemic about this, but I'm too busy organising a literature festival a cultural activity which, according to the city status website, is non-existent."

This year's festival, held over almost a fortnight in May, was the ninth.

Over the years, it has attracted authors ranging from Booker Prize winners to popular novelists, as well as nationally and inter-nationally famous person-alities and entertainers.

They have included former drug smuggler Howard Marks, zoologist Desmond Morris and pioneering feminist Ger-maine Greer.

Mr Holland added: "You click onto culture on the website and it says Swindon hasn't got any. But I am one of those people who believes that culture is with the people, and Swindon is steeped in culture.

"We have a museum culture, we have railway history and we have the culture of workers' stories."

Council spokeswoman Claudia Dench said the omission was the result of what she described as a glitch in the website, but stressed that the problem would be addressed.

She added that the festival of literature did feature in the council's city status bid document, which will be studied by the judges of the com-petition.

The document says of the town: "It also plays host to the nationally-acclaimed Swindon Festival of Literature, attracting such luminaries as Terry Waite, Melvyn Bragg and Germaine Greer."

www.Swindon.gov.uk/sb