CALLS for a memorial to victims of York's asbestos timebomb have won backing from York MP Hugh Bayley and a leading asbestos campaigner.

The MP has praised the proposal as a "very, very good idea", while union secretary and former carriageworks employee Paul Cooper has told how several women widowed by asbestos had called years ago for such a memorial.

The Evening Press reported earlier this week how relatives of two former York Carriageworks employees who have died of the asbestos-related cancer mesothelioma wanted an official memorial to the factory's scores of asbestos victims.

They suggested their names should be inscribed on Holgate Arch - the 16ft steel sculpture put up on the former carriageworks site last year.

Stuart Marshall, of Tang Hall, whose father Albert died last year, said it was wrong that there was nothing to remember the workers who had died as a result of exposure to deadly asbestos dust at the Holgate Road factory.

His plea was backed by Pat Skelton, of Wilberfoss, whose husband Stephen also died last year of mesothelioma. She said people could go to such a memorial to remember their loved ones.

Mr Bayley urged asbestos victims' relatives who supported the proposal to write to him with their views, saying: "I think this is a very, very good idea."

He said that over the years, many victims of the asbestos-related cancer mesothelioma - or their widows - had come to see him to ask for help.

He understood that when the arch was first proposed, it had been intended as a memorial to asbestos victims but it had ended up more of a memorial to the carriageworks generally and its craftsmanship.

Mr Cooper, a Transport and General Workers Union branch secretary, has long campaigned on behalf of asbestos victims. He said that he and a number of women whose husbands had died of asbestos-related diseases had been involved in initial meetings about the artwork, when it had been intended to serve as a memorial to asbestos victims. But this idea was dropped. A spokeswoman for City of York Council said there had been a great deal of consultation about a memorial before and during the erection of the archway. At the time, the majority decision was against etching names on to the frame," she said.

Updated: 10:17 Thursday, March 10, 2005