PLANS to start a Love Halstead campaign have been shelved – because the word “love” attracts graffiti artists.

Halstead Town Team had been planning on launching a new campaign with posters and stickers to encourage people to visit the town and residents to shop there, with the slogan of “Love Halstead”.

However, at its annual general meeting last month, members were advised by Essex Police not to use “love” as it attracts graffiti.

Instead, the campaign will be built around the slogan: “Enjoy Halstead”.

Secretary of the group Sara Prince said: “When we had our AGM, police sergeant Martin Richards told us that we should avoid using “love” – we can see why.

“Apparently posters with “love’ on them are more likely to be defaced.

“People can change it to other things and also words afterwards.

“Before the paint event dries, someone will have come along and changed it.

“We don’t really get a lot of graffiti in Halstead – there is not much about at the moment, but we don’t want to put something up that will attract it.

“We have decided to go with “en- joy” and this works with what we are trying to achieve – you can enjoy vis- iting the town, you can enjoy living here, and you can enjoy the things that happen in the town.”

It plans to put up window stickers and lamp-post posters with the logo and links to the new website advertising the town’s history and what there is to do there.

The town team will now investigate the availability of website address- es, such as enjoyHalstead.co.uk and HalsteadEssex.co.uk.

The decision was questioned by Halstead mum Kirsty Hay.

She said: “I’ve never heard of some- thing so laughable.

“It is the lack of services and accessible activities for the teenagers that cause graffiti, not the word ‘love’.

“If we had a little more ‘love’ in our town we would not have to battle graffiti and antisocial behaviour.

“We need to invest in the younger generation and then we may have some pride back in our town and not mindless vandalism.”

The logo will be designed by Colchester-based Hannah Whale.

The AGM took place in March at the Bull Inn, in Bridge Street, Hal- stead. Jonathan Lidster took over as chairman after Gilly Ryan stepped down, and Ann Slater was elected as vice chairman.

No-one from Essex Police was available for comment.