A FORMER museum in Gomersal is expected be put up for sale next year - three years after it closed its doors to the public.

Kirklees Council has now confirmed that it is in the process of putting the Grade II* listed 17-century Red House building on the open market.

The authority has also outlined that a planning application could be submitted to allow the former museum to be used as a home - but that this would not mean new homes being built in the grounds.

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The museum itself, which has links to the Brontes, was closed down by the Council in 2016 due to budget cuts within the authority's museums and galleries department.

Expressions of interested were invited from local groups wanting to take over the site in a community asset transfer.

But after considering three bids, the Council decided two years ago that none were suitable and the historic building would be sold off instead.

For the last two years there has been little update on the progress of the sale, but the final Community Right to Bid moratorium period formally ended last month, meaning Red House is no longer protected as an asset of community value.

Local councillor Lisa Holmes, who was president of the Friends of Red House and part of one of the community bids for the building, told the Telegraph & Argus that she hoped the whole site would be residential and not be for business use at all.

She added that she believed the Council was looking to split the site so that the main house and barn buildings could be sold separately.

"I've been pleading, 'don't let it become a business'. I can see why they would want to split the site, but the problem will be that the listing includes the walls round the Victorian garden, which they can't just remove."

She added that it would therefore be difficult to create a separate access to the barn.

Charlotte Bronte was a frequent visitor to Red House in the 1830s when it was home to her friend Mary Taylor.

Cllr Graham Turner, cabinet member for corporate at Kirklees Council, said: “We’re now in the process of putting the site on the open market and this should happen next year. We will work to ensure that this historic site goes to someone who can deliver a suitable and sustainable long-term future for it.

“There is an option for a planning application to be submitted for a change of use to residential. This would allow the existing buildings to be lived in but would not mean new homes being developed on the site. Any new development would require the relevant planning permission. The site’s historic significance and listed building status would play a part in any such decision.”