A café owner says he will not destroy a note he received which details the rumoured racist nickname of his site.

Peter St Ange, 55, of the Sea Café on The Green, Walmer, was recently told by one of his regular customers that some people in the town were referring to him and his business, which was formerly a public toilet, as *** in the Bog.

Too upset to say it aloud, the man scribbled the nickname onto a piece of paper which the father-of-two says he will now frame and display on the cafe’s Wall of Expression.

He says his decision to do so is part of his new campaign to promote conversation about racism and equality.

Mr St Ange, who moved to the area from West Norwood, London, 17 years ago and opened the café four years later, said: “I think it’s better to discuss our differences than carry on with these attitudes.

“It’s not a conversation of conflict. It’s so we can all get on better with each other and ourselves. It will let us all grow together.

“I don’t feel this is just a problem for Deal and Walmer. This is a worldwide problem. I’d rather have the discussion than not.”

Mr St Ange told KentOnline how his customer cried as he shared what he had heard.

He said: “He came into the café and was a bit agitated.

“He asked me to sit down and wanted to have a word. He actually started crying.

“He said, ‘Pete, I’ve got something to tell you. I’m embarrassed and I feel bad about it.’

“He told me he wanted to tell me the derogatory name that people in the town are calling the café but he’d have to write it down. He said he thought it was harming my business.”

This revelation in addition to a separate racial attack late last year, which Mr St Ange didn’t want to report to police, prompted him to think about ways in which he could confront the issue.

Now Mr St Ange is going to tie in his plans to change his business’s name to the Sea Café Coffee Shop with the launch of a new campaign about unity.

His new signs, which will go up later this month, will feature a black hand shaking a white hand alongside different religious symbols and a gay pride rainbow flag.

He said: “I love rainbows. No one complains that the reds are better than the blues. The beauty is the diversity of the colours.

“What a shame it would be is we woke up to a rainbow that was just green?”

He is encouraging his customers to express their thoughts and feelings in whichever way they feel comfortable, including by painting stones.

Mr St Ange calls this having a ‘Conversation with the Stones’. He already has about 500 decorated pebbles, a selection of which can be found on every table within the café.

He added: “I want to make it abundantly clear that I don’t have a problem. I’m not being victimised.

“I think it’s only a very small minority of people that are involved in this name calling.

“I’ve been welcomed with open arms in the years I’ve been here and I understand banter. This is to celebrate our differences.”

He says he hopes the campaign will lead to an annual ‘oneness’ festival.