A group of young mums have accused a businessman of being "ruder than Basil Fawlty" after he banned their crying babies from his cafe.

Francis Incorvaja told the women they were not welcome back after some of their tots began bawling as they were about to leave.

Mr Incorvaja defended his actions last night and said he was looking out for the rest of the customers at the Rotunda Cafe in Preston Park Brighton.

But first-time mum Natalie Heyman fumed: "I'm so angry - to refuse mothers in a family park is disgusting."

Natalie and her friends visited the cafe after taking part in a weekly mother and baby exercise class in the park.

The 32-year-old, of Westfield Crescent, Brighton, was with her four-month old daughter, Daisy.

She said the group of seven or eight mums had been in the cafe for about an hour and the babies had been good but as they were starting to leave some began to cry.

She said: "As we were leaving the owner said to us: Thank goodness you're leaving. You turn my customers away.' "I couldn't believe his attitude when he runs a cafe in a family park with changing facilities.

"He was ruder than Basil Fawlty. So I told him we'd be back next week and he said: No you won't, you can go to the other cafe. I won't let you in.'"

Basil Fawlty is the snobbish, miserly, xenophobic and sexually repressed paranoiac misanthrope played by John Cleese in cult 1970s sit com Fawlty Towers.

Basil is desperate to belong to a higher social class and sees the successful running of the Fawlty Towers hotel as a means of achieving this.

Yet his job forces him to be pleasant to people he despises or aspires to be above socially.

Mr Incorvaja, who has leased the cafe from the council for nine years, said one of the babies had been crying for about an hour, causing some of his regular customers to leave.

He said: "I didn't say anything to the group because I didn't want to embarrass them but I think they should have been fair to me too.

"As they were leaving I said thank goodness' in a jokey, but relieved, way and they started arguing with me.

"Eighty per cent of my business comes from families - the business would not survive without them - but I also rely on business from the offices around here, especially in winter, and I can't afford for my customers to be leaving.

"People were looking at me as if to say: Are you going to do something about it?' "I wouldn't have a business in a park if I didn't like children and usually I don't have any problems."

Do you sympathise with Mr Incorvaja or are the mums right to be offended? Leave your comments below.