A Roehampton corner shop could lose its alcohol licence for hiring an illegal worker and paying them just £2.30 an hour – a fifth of minimum wage.
Londis at 1-4 Aubyn Square will face a council hearing next week after the Home Office pushed for the shop’s licence to be revoked.
Immigration officers raided the shop on 30 October 2024 after a tip-off and found a foreign student working whose visa had expired seven months earlier.
The student entered the UK in October 2022 on a legit visa that allowed him to work 20 hours per week. But he never enrolled at university and it was cancelled in January 2024.
Officers found him working 40 hours per week at the shop for £400 a month in cash – equivalent to £2.30 an hour. The minimum wage for under 21s is £11.44.
The would-be student was interviewed on the premises and told immigration officers he was due to start getting £1,000 a month from 1 November – just two days after the raid. That would have been £5.80 an hour, still half the legal minimum.
Shop owner Jasbir Singh Kapoor, who holds the licence, was “visibly nervous” the officers reported. The official report reveals that “his hands were shaking, and he struggled to recall his date of birth.” Kapoor said he has seen the worker’s student visa but claimed he was employing him on a month’s “trial basis”. The worker, interviewed separately, undermined that story when he told officers he had been working at the shop for about four months.
£40,000 fine unpaid
Mr Kapoor’s company, Jivi Kapoor Limited, was fined £40,000 for employing someone without the right to work. The fine hasn’t been paid and has now moved to debt collection.
The Home Office argues that Kapoor’s licence should be revoked because the business employed illegal workers “for commercial reasons.”
“Immigration Enforcement submits that for commercial reasons those engaged in the management of the premises employed illegal workers and a warning or other activity falling short of a review is inappropriate,” the Home Office review application states.
Government guidance says employing someone banned from work by their immigration status should be treated “particularly seriously” and that “revocation of the licence – even in the first instance – should be seriously considered.” It is not known what happened to the worker, an Indian national, following the immigration raid.
No community objections
The council says it ran a public consultation between 19 August and 15 September but got no responses from residents, police or other authorities.
The shop has had an alcohol licence since 2005. Mr Kapoor took over as licence holder in 2022. If the licence is revoked, the shop would be banned from selling alcohol but could keep operating as a general store.
Three councillors will decide the case at a hearing on 7 October at 7pm in the Town Hall. They can revoke the licence, suspend it for up to three months, add new conditions, or take no action. Any decision can be appealed within 21 days.
The hearing is open to the public.
