The patience of local residents seems to be running thin over the conduct of some naturists at the famous resort of Cape d'Agde in Languedoc Roussillon.

Cape d’Agde is the leading naturist resort in France, which attracts around 40,000 naturist tourists from all over the world each summer.

The problem for the resort is that it has also become synonymous with a libertine lifestyle, well beyond the bounds of respectable naturism.

It is also a lifestyle that locals complain has spilled over into other areas of the town not reserved for naturists.

A recent meeting of the town council was disrupted by campaigners who sought to express their exasperation at the deterioration in the moral standards of the town during the summer, and the impact is was having on the image of the resort.

They complained that families who wished to come to the naturist resort itself were increasingly being put off from doing so, simply because of the prevalance of sexual acts taking place.

One local letting agent stated that: ‘'Today, practically all the shops on the naturist camp are based around sex. We have become a purely sexual destination, not at all one for families.’'

Others stated that they now only welcome friends and relatives to the town outside of the tourist season, simply because of the ambiance that the libertine naturists created.

Gilles d’Ettore, the deputy mayor of the council denies that there is a problem, arguing that he receives few complaints, and that the level of criminality amongst the naturists was lower than elsewhere within the town.

As far as sexual acts in public were concerned, he stated that these were ‘'strictly a personal affair.'’

He claimed that the town had in place a brigade of gendarmes on horseback to monitor access in and out of the naturist resort, but that they had no intention of copying the approach adopted at Saint Tropez, ‘'where there was a police officer behind every naturist.’'