Pembrokeshire County Council’s commitment to openness and transparency was again called into question today (Thursay).

Local member for Solva, Councillor Lyn Jenkins, told today’s extraordinary council meeting that she had not heard that her local school was under threat of closure until Friday, when the agenda for today’s meeting came out.

The council’s Director of Education is proposing to consult on the closure of primary schools in both Solva and St Davids, as well as Ysgol Dewi Sant to make way for a new 3-16 voluntary controlled school.

“I’m not excited or enthusiastic about the recommendations and I am very uneasy about them,” said Cllr Jenkins.

“The first the head, the governors, the staff, and myself as the local member knew about the proposals to close was on Friday when the information was put in the public domain, as you can imagine there were shockwaves throughout.

She said the proposal sounded like a “done deal” and that the director’s assertion that Solva was “in poor condition” had not been backed up by a recent site visit.

She said that the headteacher, staff, governors and children had put their all into getting the school out of special measures, into which it had been placed by Estyn last January and were expecting to go from the bottom to near the top.

She added that the learning environment at the school had been classed as “good” by Estyn and that the establishment was currently oversubscribed.

“Do we really want to have 75 three to 11 year olds transported by bus on a daily basis?” she asked.

She said the closure of the school would impact on the diverse after school activities and the character of the village.

“We feel we are being backed into a corner,” she said.

Fellow councillors expressed their displeasure that Cllr Jenkins had not been informed of the potential closure of her local school.

“I’m concerned how Cllr Lynne Jenkins was communicated regarding the closure of a school in her ward. I thought we were going to have a new way of communicating in this authority,” said Cllr Tom Tudor.

“That’s not the way we should be doing things,” added Cllr Bob Killmister. “It shouldn’t happen again. “ Council chair Wynne Evans said that the authority’s chief executive would be talking to Cllr Jenkins and the director of education to address the matter in the next few days.