Campaigners are hoping former Singers workers will write in support of saving the factory’s namesake mansion.

Efforts are underway to prevent Oldway Mansion from going into private hands even as the local council running the site in Devon is reportedly shelling out £150,000 a year in upkeep of the empty historic site.

Originally built in Paignton by Isaac Merritt Singer on the back of wealth from Clydebank’s success making sewing machines in the 19th and 20th century, the local elected mayor, Gordon Oliver, has announced he plans to sell it off.

Councillors have objected and a crunch meeting is set for Thursday that could decide the fate of the structure. The mayor insists it is his decision and taxpayers can no longer support the bills.

Community partnership campaigner Liz Rayner told the Post the mansion should be kept as a public asset.

She said: “I am feeling increasingly nervous about the full council meeting on Thursday, June 21 that it may be decided it’s a mayoral decision to sell Oldway off to the highest bidder.

“If we had a positive response from ex-Singer factory workers and historical interest groups, it really would go towards saving the building - for the community project to restore it.

“The Singer family descendants fully support the idea the community runs the old place as a charitable trust or community interest company, just to get the place restored and back into use by the people of Paignton, who Isaac Merritt Singer left it to.”

The building has been empty since 2013. A plan to turn it into a luxury hotel fell through in 2016.

The mayor said last week: “Many people in Paignton have an ambition for the council to keep Oldway and maintain it, but at the end of the day the people of the whole of Torbay have to pay for it. Each day that goes by is costing Torbay money.

“It is costing £150,000 a year just to do nothing with it. I’ve still got to find £6million in cuts for next year and £9million the year after that.

“The council doesn’t need the building, but we need to preserve it, and the action I have taken immediately gets on with dealing with the dry rot.”

- Campaigners have asked for messages of support to be emailed to the mayor at mayor@torbay.gov.uk.