Barber’s hit with £1,000 fine for cutting people’s hair during lockdown

City of London Police says ‘blatant disregard’ of rules ‘won’t be tolerated’

The owner of a London barber’s has been fined £1,000 after police discovered customers having their hair cut during lockdown.

Bodycam footage shared by City of London Police showed officers entering the Barbican hairdresser’s on Saturday afternoon to find two people sitting receiving a trim.

The windows of the Grooming Lounge had been covered up with newspapers in an apparent bid to avoid detection.

But a member of the public tipped off police that the business was still operating and officers arrived to investigate at around 2:40pm, according to a statement from the force.

“Most people are doing their part and obeying the rules to protect the NHS and save lives, but we will continue to deal with those who flout the rules putting everyone at risk,” the force tweeted.

“This is a blatant disregard of coronavirus regulations and won’t be tolerated,” it added. “The message is clear: stay at home.”

City of London Superintendent James Morgan said: “The few individuals who take it upon themselves to disregard the rules not only undermine the sacrifice the vast majority are making, but they put the community, NHS and lives at risk.

“When this happens, we will enforce the rules.”

Speaking during a Downing Street press conference on Tuesday headed up by home secretary Priti Patel – who said nearly 45,000 fixed penalty notices had been handed out to Covid rule-breakers so far – National Police Chiefs’ Council chair Martin Hewitt warned there were “still too many” people flouting the regulations.

“With a virus spreading so rapidly through contact with others, we should all be asking ourselves whether our reason to leave home is truly essential. Those personal decisions are critical,” Mr Hewitt said.

"Since October, we’ve been guiding our officers to move more quickly to issuing a fine where people are clearly breaching regulations and they’re not listening to us … but there are still too many who are choosing not to, and in doing so they’re endangering us all.

“And so it’s important for me to be really clear, at this critical time, we will have more officers out on dedicated patrols to take action against the small few who are letting us all down.”

It came as a Federation of Small Businesses report warned that at least 250,000 small businesses face closure unless they are given additional government help.

The survey of 1,400 small firms suggested a record number expect to close over the next year.

In response to the report, a Business Department spokesperson said: “We understand these are extremely challenging circumstances for businesses, which is why we have put in place one of the most comprehensive and generous packages of business support in the world worth £280bn.

“This includes a new one-off grant worth up to £9,000, VAT relief, various loan schemes, a business rates holiday as well as the extended furlough scheme.”