Travellers who invaded a seafront car park over Easter were not given parking tickets to avoid "inflaming the situation" while other drivers were being fined.

The 50-strong gathering of vehicles in the Neptune car park in Herne Bay was treated as an illegal encampment, says the city council.

Officials admit that while the unauthorised visitors enjoyed free parking for four days, 24 penalty tickets were issued to other drivers in the town over the same period.

Canterbury City Council’s head of safer communities Douglas Rattray said: "It has to be remembered those tickets were issued because someone was caught breaking the rules. Two wrongs do not make a right."

The council, which previously struggled to evict travellers from the Kingsmead car park in Canterbury, says it is now reviewing security arrangements and legal avenues to prevent a reoccurrence at the car park.

The occupation seriously inconvenienced other visitors and blocked the launch ramp for boats and jet skis.

The council lost hundreds of pounds in parking revenue and was also landed with a clean-up operation after the travellers left on Monday morning.

A team of four Serco workers and two vans were deployed and had to pick up litter scattered across the car park, including a soiled nappies, drink bottles, cans and takeaway boxes.

Mr Rattray said: "Our focus was on ending this illegal action as soon as possible to ensure the least amount of disruption to the town’s residents and visitors.

"Our enforcement officers were quickly on site to kickstart the legal process. It is undoubtedly the case that a difficult situation that could have gone on for much longer was brought to a swift conclusion."

Mr Rattray said the council was also required by law to carry out a welfare assessment before eviction in case children, elderly and vulnerable people need to be referred to other agencies for help.

He said: "We also have to issue a warning giving at least 24 hours for the camp to be dismantled and the service of the relevant notices to leave.

"If that does not work, we need to arrange a court hearing, serve the summons and then persuade the court to issue an eviction order. The courts were closed until Tuesday. The encampment ended on Monday.

"We understand people may be concerned that no fines were issued, but our considerable experience in dealing with many similar incidents over the years is that issuing lots of fines or blocking exits - which we do not have the power to do anyway - only has the potential to inflame a situation and is ultimately counter productive.

"Without doubt, a calmer, more reasoned approach gets the result everyone wants - the people moving on much more quickly."