The owner of a restaurant says closing its doors has been "a massive shame," but insists it was an "uphill struggle" for some time.

Carlyle's, in Sheerness High Street, opened on January 7 following its rebrand of Durtnall's.

The latter, which only opened last October, closed when owner John Durtnall called it a day.

It was then relaunched as Carlyle's when Lee McCall took over, and name the restaurant in honour of his grandfather. He was a silent partner with Mr Durtnall prior to its closure.

Despite Mr McCall's best efforts in creating a new menu with cheaper prices, the eatery has now closed following problems with staff and footfall.

He says the decision was taken at the start of May, with existing bookings ensuring it remained open until the middle of the month.

Mr McCall, who was also an Independent councillor representing Sheerness on Swale council before losing his seat in May, says the restaurant has struggled for business since peaking in the winter.

The 42-year-old explained: “We lost a chef which obviously didn't help, so trying to find new staff members proved to be very difficult.

"At the weekends we were fully booked, but during the week it was a different story with not enough custom.

"Getting the staff to cope with a busy restaurant has also not been easy.

"Business did pick up after Christmas with the change of menu and lower prices, but it never stayed or picked up further after that, which was hard given I was pretty much on my own.

"We also couldn't then just change the licence to simply be classed as a pub - we would have had to apply for a whole new licence rather than make a minor amendment, and that would have cost even more for us to do.

"So with the funds we had at the time and the debts we were repaying, that would have made it difficult anyway so we decided to cut our losses while we could.

"It was just an uphill struggle from the beginning really which is a massive shame, but hopefully someone will come along and keep it as a restaurant or a bar for the future when the landlord puts it up for auction on June 15."

He says the £40,000 originally put into Durtnall's last autumn was always a risk worth taking.

However, he says the impacts of lockdown are still being felt across the board, notably in the catering industry.

The demise of the eatery has also coincided with the loss of his seat during this year's Swale Borough Council (SBC) elections.

He added: "I tried to do something for the town, like others have done with other new places to eat, but if people in the town don't use them or can't afford to eat out, it's very difficult to survive.

"So it's not been a great month after the election defeat.

"I still believe now that we could have done a great job and made a success of the restaurant, but a lot of chefs throughout the pandemic retrained in other areas to make ends meet, and that also made a difference to getting some additions.

"I have a cleaning business though which will tick me over, and four years to wait to get back into politics.”