Having a fag cost six people £400 each when they dropped the cigarette ends as litter.

Dover District Council brought the prosecutions and each offender was fined £220 and made to pay a £30 victim surcharge and costs of £150.

Each was caught in the act by a council officer who approached them and issued a fixed penalty notice.

When this was not paid the council took the matter to Canterbury Magistrates Court.

All the hearings were on Tuesday and all six Dover people were found guilty in their absence of dropping litter.

Donna Boorman, 27, of Westbury Road, dropped her fag end outside Dover Priory train station on April 20.

Matthew Pope, 27, of Clarendon Place, dropped his litter in the area of Edwards Road in the town centre on April 21.

Shaun Breeden, 32, of Glenfield Road, and Richard Blakeman, 57, of Folkestone Road, both littered the area of Effingham Street that same day.

Tafida Gabr , of Tower Hill, dropped her fag end in Pencester Gardens on April 24.

Ross Shields, 30, of Stembrook Court, did the same in Biggin Street on April 25.