A homeowner says his property has been targeted by vandals due to a long-running saga over giving up land for a much needed path.

Keith Endicott was asked by Kent County Council to allow part of his back garden to be used for a pavement in Highsted Road, Sittingbourne, making the route safer for people on foot, particularly children attending Highsted Grammar School.

The 76-year-old and his neighbours in Haysel, which backs on to the road, were approached by KCC in 2014.

The authority wanted the land for free and without conditions. When some residents refused to part with their plots unconditionally, KCC said it was unable to proceed with the walkway.

That decision, said Mr Endicott, resulted in a backlash against him and others from those who wanted to see a path put in, with stones and mud thrown at windows and dog mess hurled over the fence.

More than two years on, and the pensioner’s home has once again been vandalised. A garden sign was ripped up and thrown at the patio doors last month and a bedroom window was smashed a few days later.

Mr Endicott thinks the motive was the path saga, after the issue was raised again in a newsletter. He said: “It was put in a councillor’s newsletter a couple of weeks ago that it was a KCC planning problem and problems over ownership which have stopped the path being built.

“People have got it into their heads that we’re what’s stopping this, but we just want some conditions before we hand over the land.

“I actually want to give them the land, providing they put up a fence and a wall, but they want me to give it over unreservedly.”

Mr Endicott, who has lived there with his wife Ann, 74, for 30 years, said since the previous attack he had resorted to putting up signs saying he had offered KCC the land.

He said: “If they don’t stop then someone is going to get hurt and it will probably be us.”

The stalemate over the path looks set to continue, as a KCC spokesman said it would not happen “due to the land not being in the control of KCC”, adding: “There is a suitable footway leading to the school via Swanstree Avenue, Brenchley Road and Bell Road, and with very little difference in distance from the junction of Highsted Road with Swanstree Avenue.”