The Mayor of Tenby has said it is vital that the town is not left to "suffer and struggle" following the news that Pembrokeshire County Council is to cut the resort's gardening maintenance finances by half.

Speaking at Tuesday night's meeting of the town council, Mayor, Clr. Mrs. Sue Lane, who is also chairman of the Tenby In Bloom committee, told her colleagues that the budget cuts would affect not just the floral features of the town, but also other environmental aspects too, and that it was essential that volunteers and the people of the town came together to help out.

"Can I just repeat, it's not just floral issues that are being hit here, but also the town's street furniture and the cleanliness of the streets and resort, as beach cleaning in the winter will suffer too," she said.

"We can't let the town suffer and struggle, it's vital we keep Tenby vibrant, as we've worked so hard over the past few years to get it back up to scratch."

The county council have announced a reduction to planting and hanging baskets across the resort and even proposed grassing over some floral areas of the town, which last year claimed its 29th title and a Silver Gilt in the small country town section of the Wales in Bloom contest and also received recognition at the International Communities in Bloom awards held in Canada, achieving a '5 bloom' status.

The authority has also proposed introducing wild flowers into iconic areas such as the 'Welcome to Tenby' area that greets many into the town.

"We need to make a decision now as to whether we as as town council can fund certain aspects of planting ourselves, such as the 'Welcome to Tenby' area, as the county council are ready to go with the wildflowers," explained the town clerk, Mr. Andrew Davies.

"We don't have the equipment ourselves to even water any planting, so another option is to pay someone to do this," he added.

Clr. Mrs. Lane said that the town council were indeed looking into taking over some services and would probably need to employ a town manager to oversee any gardening work.

"It's dreadful and I don't know how we recover from this, but we have to rally around and see what we can do," she said.

"We are desperate for helpers and volunteers, so if you can dig or paint something, then I'd urge people who'd like to help to get in touch. We've already started work in some areas, but need more manpower," added Clr. Mrs. Lane, who called for an urgent meeting to be arranged, with both the town's county councillors to discuss the matter further.

Clr. Lawrence Blackhall said that it would have been useful if the town council had been given an indication of the funding cut before they set the budget for the year.

"We were invited to a meeting not so long ago at County Hall to discuss budget cuts by the county council, so if we'd known this then, we could have planned a bit better for the year.

"We set the budget so that there would be no increase to the people of Tenby and now we're being asked to magic some money out of nowhere. We're constantly being drip fed cuts, then asked to pick up the pieces, and while I'm not belittling the cuts made by the county council, it would be nice to have had the information fully, so we could have a clearer picture of what will be lost and what won't," added Clr. Blackhall, who agreed that an emergency meeting was needed with county council officers on the matter.