BEACH hut owners are outraged after mindless vandals covered the sides of their property with paint.

The line of huts near Hove Lagoon was targeted overnight during the weekend and distraught owners discovered the extent of the damage on Sunday morning.

It has also been reported that another beach hut was broken into on Sunday night.

City councillor Robert Nemeth represents Wish ward, where the beach huts are sited, and founded the Hove Beach Hut Association.

This is a non-political group that defends the rights and interests of all beach hut owners in the area.

It was formed in September 2018.

He said: “Hove’s iconic beach huts bring such pleasure to residents and visitors alike.

“What possesses somebody to scribble on them is beyond me.

“Whoever is responsible should be made to clean off graffiti around the town to give them some idea as to the inconvenience that has been caused.”

The backs of the huts were covered in a series of letters, symbols and tags. But there were no discernible words.

This is not the first time the beach huts have been targeted by vandals. On New Year’s Day, three huts had their locks forced and were left with their doors open.

A Brighton and Hove City Council spokesman said: “Graffiti is an ongoing problem in the city and it’s extremely disheartening to see the iconic seafront beach huts defaced in this way.

“All the beach huts are privately owned, so the owners are responsible for their upkeep.

“However, we will be contacting them individually to offer support and encouraging them to report the vandalism to the police.”

In October a prolific graffiti tagger was caught on camera spraying his “LABR”tag on various shop buildings in North Street in the early hours of April 3.

The 22-year-old, who police refused to name, was arrested and later admitted to daubing his graffiti tag more than 80 times across Brighton city centre.

Detective Sergeant Joe Jardine said: “The tag in question – the letters LABR – was prevalent across Brighton city centre.

“With the help of our partners, we identified 81 individual tags and numerous separate crimes were recorded.”

But it was later revealed he had been released after accepting a conditional caution, which included doing a day of unpaid work for the city council as part of a community payback scheme.