Restaurant shut down over illegal workers

A CITY centre restaurant has had its licence to trade revoked after five illegal immigrants were found there in what one officer said was the ‘worst case’ he had seen in 20 years.

Tasty Restaurant, in Station Street, near New Street Station, was shut down after bosses failed to show up to a meeting to decide its fate.

It comes after three men and two women were detained during an inspection in November, none of whom had the right to work in the UK.

Despite being listed as the licence holder, Mr Yang Cheng has still not been located, leading officers to note that he had ‘lost control of the business’.

Licensing officer Gary Callaghan said it could not be established whether the workers were there by force, with no one at the premises willing to speak to police or council officers.

Four of the five people detained have since applied for asylum, while the fifth has gone missing.

And he added that, over the course of a 20-year career as a licensing officer, this was the ‘worst case’ he had ever seen.

“During the visit to the premises it was chaos, for at least half an hour,” he said. “Because the people that were detained they wouldn’t speak, wouldn’t identify themselves. “The Home Office immigration had to do ID checks, fingerprint checks, to try and establish who they were, and none of them were coming up with anything.

“Subsequently I spoke to a gentleman who appeared to be in charge, and he was extremely uncooperative, unhelpful, didn’t know where the premises licence was, didn’t know anything to do with any of the conditions on the licence.

“The people who were detained wouldn’t answer why they were in the country, how they got into the country, there’s a whole range of questions that are unanswered.

“It was total chaos, it’s the worst I’ve been to, to be fair.”

Since the inspection it has emerged that the restaurant also owes more than £150,000 in business rates, while the licence holder’s listed home address was found to be another

Chinese restaurant where ‘no one had ever heard of Yeng Cheng.’

The judgment follows on from another against the same chain of restaurants in Bath in March of last year, when enforcement officers working for the council found six illegal workers working at another Tasty Restaurant.

The Bath location has since closed down, though there are a further five restaurants currently operating across the country.