DUBAI: Council officers working in East London have been told to show more common sense after shutting down a 5-year-old’s lemonade stall and fining her father £150 ($195).
University professor Andre Spicer was helping his daughter set up a stall at the end of their street where hundreds of music fans were passing to go to a festival.
But within 30 minutes of setting up their mini business four council enforcement officers arrived and read from a legal notice.
The jobs worth officers told the heart broken child that she could not continue trading as she did not have a permit and that she and her father would be fined £150.
In a letter to UK daily The Telegraph, Spicer said: “I’m a professor in a business school, so I probably should have known some kind of permit was required. But this was a 5-year-old kid selling lemonade. She wasn’t exactly a public safety hazard.”
And he said his daughter was so upset she “sobbed all the way home.”
And he said she told him: “I’ve done a bad thing.”
Spicer told the newspaper he offered to get the relevant permit, so his daughter could sell lemonade on another day, but the little girl was so upset she said it was “too scary.”
Since the incident, a Tower Hamlets council spokesman confirmed the fine had been withdrawn.
“We are very sorry that this has happened,” the spokesman said. “We expect our enforcement officers to show common sense and to use their powers sensibly. This clearly did not happen.
“The fine will be canceled immediately and we have contacted Professor Spicer and his daughter to apologize.”