A last-minute bid to halt eviction proceedings against a pensioner who refuses to leave an old people's home has ended in failure.

The fate of Stan Smith, 80, will now be decided by a judge on April 4, after calls for an emergency meeting of a West Sussex County Council committee were rejected.

Mr Smith is the last remaining resident of Nyewood House in Hawthorn Road, Bognor, which the county council voted to shut 18 months ago.

More than 40 residents have moved to other homes but Mr Smith is refusing to leave, claiming he expected the building to be his home for the rest of his life.

Seven Bognor-based county, district and town councillors who met Mr Smith this week joined forces to call for an emergency meeting of West Sussex social and caring services select committee.

The councillors, led by Bognor mayor Sylvia Olliver, who is also a county councillor, wanted the committee to put the legal proceedings on hold until there has been a full review of Mr Smith's case.

But their plea was rejected today by scrutiny committee chairman Heather Ross, who said: "This has come too late and it will be up to the court to decide."

Bognor town councillor Jan Cosgrove, who signed the plea for a special meeting, said: "Stan is a brave man and his councillors and community are standing with him."

Mr Smith's legal team will now have to contest the eviction order at a county court hearing, which is being convened at Nyewood House on April 4.

Judge John Sessions, who is hearing the case, said he would travel to the home after being told at an earlier hearing that Mr Smith was too frail to attend Chichester County Court.