Unanimous support has been given towards investigating whether Helston’s kennels could be placed on the World Heritage List, by the town’s councillors.

As revealed by the Helston Packet last week, councillor Mike Thomas has put forward the suggestion for the historic water system, the various sections of which are already grade listed structures.

Asking for the support of his fellow members when they met last week, Mr Thomas said: “At this stage this is just an idea I’m throwing out on the table for consideration.

“The origins of the kennels are discussed and debated. I think we’d find we’d have to have some form of study on the kennels. It’s something we could do with Heritage Lottery funding.

“That would give us a chance to explore and have a really good piece of history about the kennels. Some people believe they go back to medieval times, to the charter itself, and that the kennels we have to day evolved over time.”

His successful proposition was that once the local government elections had taken place in May, the town clerk’s office might then have some time to look into what would be involved in applying for World Heritage status.

Councillor Ronnie Williams was keen not to see a repeat of a situation a few years ago, when the kennels ran dry for almost three years due to a disagreement involving Cornwall Council and the owners of the land the kennels cross, from the Wendron parish into Helston.

“It took the best part of two years of negotiating and meeting to get them running again,” he recalled, adding: “I would not want to upset the whole issue with World Heritage this, that and something else.”

He did, however, vote for the matter to be looked into further.

Should Mr Thomas’s idea become a reality, a place on UNESCO’S World Heritage List would rank the kennels alongside the likes of the pyramids of Egypt and the Great Barrier Reef.

Such an honour is only granted by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation to sites of "outstanding universal value" that meet at least one of ten criteria.

Perhaps of most interest to Helston's potential bid are the criteria relating to "exhibiting an important interchange of human values, on developments in architecture or technology, monumental arts, town-planning or landscape design and “bearing a unique or at least exceptional testimony to a cultural tradition or to a civilization."

Others include being an "outstanding example of a type of building, architectural or technological ensemble or landscape which illustrates significant stage(s) in human history," and "being an outstanding example of a traditional human settlement, which is representative of a culture, or human interaction with the environment."