A veteran councillor found himself down in the dumps when he was accidentally locked inside a Pembrokeshire civic amenity compound for over an hour and a half.

Trevor Hallett, the senior member of Tenby Town Council, has now received an apology from Pembrokeshire County Council following his ordeal at the Waterloo centre in Pembroke Dock.

The 77-year-old - who has been mayor of Tenby four times - had driven to the site with some garden waste and a broken vacuum cleaner as a favour for a friend.

After speaking to a site operator and unloading his rubbish, he headed for the exit, only to find it had been locked up for the night and he was alone on the site.

“It was a good job I had my mobile phone with me and could get a signal,” said Councillor Hallett this week. “I could have had an accident and no-one would have known until next day.”

“I would hope that the council will now review its procedures to make sure that members of the public have left civic amenity sites before they shut.”

Councillor Hallett’s skip saga took place on Wednesday January 27, when he arrived at 3.45pm. He spoke to a site operator before unloading his rubbish.

“After about 15 minutes, I drove to the site exit, only to find it locked,” he explained. “I shouted, but there was no answer, so I turned my car around and returned to the entrance gate, which was also locked.”

Unable to find an emergency system and with all information numbers outside the entrance, Councillor Hallett then rang police on 101 from his mobile phone and spent three quarters of an hour attempting to get through to the Dyfed-Powys force.

He was told that the site manager would be along shortly to let him out, but in the meantime managed to attract the attention of the driver of a Pembrokeshire County Council vehicle going past the gates who also contacted the site manager who arrived to release him.

Councillor Hallett has since received a phone apology from the site operator and a letter from the council’s waste operations supervisor Nigel Cole, who told him: “Please be assured that this is not our usual standard of site management and steps will be taken to ensure that this should not happen again.”