Pembrokeshire County Council's constitutional issues working group has not met since last April, the council's corporate governance committee heard on Monday.

The group is trying to establish a draft constitution based on the Welsh Government's model constitution.

Councillor Paul Miller proposed that a working group reported with a draft constitution before or on December 19.

"I very much hope we can take that forward and deliver a more transparent way of working within the authority," he said.

"The constitution was written by an individual who put himself in the centre of a spider's web. The constitutional working group is the right way to do this but it just isn't meeting, the leader is not calling meetings. It needs to be addressed to restore public trust in the authority."

Councillors from across the political divide agreed that the current methods employed by the working group, which involve analysing the model constitution line by line, were inefficient.

"The present method we have got is fundamentally failing in every respect," said Cllr Bob Kilmister. "Going through it page by page is very painful and not to be repeated."

Leader Jamie Adams said he would be happy to steer away from the Welsh Government model constitution in favour of a clear set of guiding principles that members can sign up to. He recommended outsourcing the drafting of this document.

The committee unanimously agreed that group leaders and the representative for non-affiliated councillors should meet and come back to the next corporate governance committee meeting with a way forward.