A call for council assets are advertised “to the greatest audience possible” has been refused by senior councillors.

A Notice of Motion relating to the disposal of assets was put by Cllr John Cole last year and has been considered by over view and scrutiny committee before coming before Pembrokeshire County Council’s cabinet this week.

On Monday (July 25) cabinet endorsed the view of the policy and pre-decision committee that the motion not be adopted, largely because of legal provision under the Local Government Act and case law, that a council has the right to “dispose of land held by them in any manner they wish.”

The most suitable method of disposal is to be determined on a case-by-case basis and in some scenarios advertising on the open market is not the most suitable, for example when there are sitting tenants, land-locked ‘jigsaw’ pieces of land or gardens, as well as transfer to housing revenue account stock, cabinet heard.

Cabinet member for finance Cllr Alec Cormack put forward an amendment to the recommendation for approval that pending the outcome of an external review of strategic asset management and a review of the disposals policy, advance approval of any disposals not on the open market be sought.

Cllr Guy Woodham added that any such actions be included in a report to cabinet for the sake of “transparency.”