Landowners have been ordered to stop the grot and clean up the site of an illegally demolished pub or face being fined.

Gravesham council has served a section 215 notice on the owners of the land formerly occupied by the Battle of Britain pub in Coldharbour Road, Northfleet.

The site has fallen into a state of disrepair and has become overgrown and littered with rubbish, it says.

Residents were left furious in 2016 when bulldozers arrived and started to tear the historic boozer down without permission. This was put down to a "communication error".

It caused further outrage when council officers told the workers to stop, only to be ignored.

In the end the council was forced to allow the complete demolition of the pub because it was structurally unsafe.

Now the local authority has issued a maintenance notice, known as a section 215, ordering that the poor state of the site be addressed.

It says it is taking action against the owner of the site due to its squalid condition including dumped rubbish, damaged fence banners and overgrown vegetation.

The notice gives the owner 28 days to clear the site before further action will be taken.

All waste from the land should be disposed of using a licenced waste carrier and to a licensed waste disposal site.

Failure to carry out the works required is an offence, which on prosecution in the magistrates’ court, could lead to a fine of up to £1,000.

The Battle of Britain pub had been built by RAF personnel to commemorate Gravesend being the first RAF station to operate the American P-51 Mustang III fighter-bomber.

A decision over a planning bid to build more than two dozen homes on the site was originally deferred but a revised proposal including fewer homes was subsequently approved in December.

Read more: All the latest news from Gravesend