A FORMER head of the Charity Commission has called for the decision to close York's Minster Library to be investigated.

Robin Guthrie, who was Chief Charity Commissioner from 1988-92, has written to the Charity Commission asking it to look into the matter.

Mr Guthrie, who lives in York, told the Evening Press that gifts to the library over the centuries had been made on the basis of trust, and that the library had been provided with charitable as well as public support.

"It may be that everything has been properly dealt with," he said. "But it is important that, if there are charitable trusts involved, somebody checks that everything has been done according to charity law." Mr Guthrie's letter draws the attention of the Charity Commissioners to the Constitution and Statutes of York Minster, signed on April 23, 2000, by the then Dean, Raymond Furnell, and the Chapter Clerk, Peter Lyddon, which make specific reference to the maintenance of a library.

It continues: "I do not know the extent to which the library and its assets are governed by specific charitable trusts, but I suspect that, even if charitable trusts are not specified, they may, in effect, exist.

"There would seem to me to be a prima facie case for investigation of the decision by the Dean and Chapter, in respect first to their responsibility as trustees to maintain public access to the collections, and secondly to the extent of their right to dispose of the contents of the library."

Mr Guthrie's intervention adds further weight to the campaign to keep the library open in its present form.

It comes in advance of a meeting between the Archbishop of York Dr David Hope and the Dean and Chapter later this month, at which a compromise deal is expected to be thrashed out whereby the Minster Library will be retained, but the Archbishop will agree to charges for entry to the Minster itself.

Campaigners opposed to the closure plan, who include York-born former Health Secretary Frank Dobson, plan to present the Archbishop with a petition tomorrow to keep up the pressure.

The Archbishop's official spokesman, Rob Marshall, who also speaks for the Dean and Chapter on the Minster library, said today he was unable to comment on the Charity Commissioners' involvement until the meeting between the Archbishop and the Dean and Chapter, when "every aspect of the proposals is being looked at", had taken place.

Updated: 10:47 Wednesday, June 11, 2003