A REGIMENTAL museum chronicling the 315-year history of the Fusiliers could create a major tourist attraction in Bury.

And, as exclusively revealed by the Bury Times last year, the arts and crafts college in the town centre is expected to house the multi-million pound museum.

The project will ensure the survival of Bury Arts and Crafts Centre, although its current users would move to a more modern building, the former Halifax business complex in Haymarket.

Bury Council bosses are expected to back the initiative when they meet on Wednesday.

If approved, the museum would recount the long history of Lancashire Fusiliers, and narrate the daring military operations of the 35-year-old Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.

It would also feature artefacts chronicling Bury's role in 300 years of war through audio and visual interactive information units.

Bury Council's Adrian Frost said the new museum would become a centre of excellence and a huge tourist attraction. He said: "This museum will be a showcase for the history and achievements of the regiment. It will document the social history of the soldiers, give visitors greater understanding of the Army, past and present, and introduce new generations to the military history of Bury and Lancashire."

The estimated £2 million cost of the museum would be met through National Lottery and English Heritage funding, as well as from the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers (RRF), Bury Council and public donations.

The RRF headquarters staff and the Fusilier Association club would move to the Broad Street museum, paving the way for the Ministry of Defence to sell the buildings at Wellington Barracks. The Luytens-designed war memorial outside the barracks would move to Sparrow Park, by the new site.

Colonel Brian Gorski, deputy colonel of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers (Lancashire), said: "My aim is not to destroy Bury's historical links with the Lancashire Fusiliers and the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, but to enhance them.

"A move to a more central location will ensure that a wider audience and a new generation will learn about the regiment's proud heritage and achievements and the vital role Bury and Lancashire played over the past three centuries.

However, artists are prepared to do battle over the plans for a military museum in Bury.

More than 1,500 art students face being moved from the Arts and Crafts Centre in Broad Street to make way for a new regimental museum and heritage centre.

Mary Edyvean, who has been at the forefront of a ten-year campaign to force the local authority to invest in the Broad Street building, said: "Our fight is not against the Fusiliers. We support their need for a new museum in the town centre. We just don't want in to be in the Arts and Crafts Centre.

"The fight is against Bury Council, who have refused to invest in the centre and have now taken the easy way out by leasing it as a regimental museum."

Faced with a bill for repairs and modernisation of £1.4m, the council has agreed in principle to lease the present Arts and Crafts Centre building to the Fusiliers and relocate the lifelong learning provision.

Councillor John Byrne, the leader of the council, described the proposals as "a unique opportunity" for the borough. He said: "The arrival of the Fusiliers museum would expand the town's cultural quarter and bring with it a major new tourism attraction with increased access for visitors.

"We appreciate that this will mean some inconvenience and a wrench to some of the arts and crafts centre's existing users but officers are suggesting we replace those facilities with a state-of-the-art new home for the town's lifelong learning service.

"That would mean investing in the service and making it more accessible to more people providing better facilities for everyone, including those using the existing building."

But Mrs Edyvean believes the Arts and Crafts Centre users have been betrayed by the council. She said: "The arts and craft building has been a part of the history of Bury for more than 100 years. We fear it that heritage will be lost.

"This is an absolute abhorrent move by the council. We discussed the Fusiliers using some of the building last year and we were in agreement. The council has now given them virtually all the space without consulting anyone. The Fusiliers would be better in the Haymarket."