WAR ON VANDALS
TOWN hall bosses have been urged to do more to prevent a war memorial from being vandalised.
The bronze plaques in the Northern Quarter in Manchester city centre commemorate men who gave their lives for the country in the First and Second World Wars. The graffiti was daubed onto a poppy mural below.
Andrew Gallimore, 40, from Bury, says he walks past the mural daily and this month more unsightly graffiti has been scrawled on.
The plaques remember the men of J & N Philips and Co Ltd who fought and died in both world wars.
Founded in Staffordshire in 1747, the textile manufacturer’s Manchester building stood on the site where the car park stands today.
Andrew said: “I first saw small bits of graffiti on the war mural on Tib Street in January.
“This month someone has completely gone over it in purple and added more graffiti.
“I thought how can someone do that? There used to be signs saying ‘please don’t tag this mural’, but all over the NQ there is graffiti and it’s all over the mural.
“I contacted the artist Mural life and Qubek Manchester and they said they would try to sort it out as soon as possible. I feel angry and upset, I have contacted the police, the council and Andy Burnham – but I feel like what is the point in complaining?
Manchester city centre’s main cenotaph war memorial stands in front of the Cooper Street entrance to the town hall.
It was moved there in 2014 from a site nearby between the St Peter’s Square Metrolink platform and Mosley Street in the city centre.
In January Councillor Pat Karney, the council’s city centre spokesman, said: “It is hard to understand how people can vandalise a memorial to people who gave so much for Manchester and their country.
“People in Manchester will be rightly disgusted by this – and the fact that any vandalism can take place at any sacred memorial.”