Ian Allan railway model shop knife sale

I've just seen the news story about the railway book & model shop on Lower Marsh being fined £5 grand, plus costs, plus 'victim surcharge'.

What are Lambeth Council playing at, entrapping small businesses then prosecuting them? Was this a repeated problem or did they sell one craft tool set to the kid in the sting operation?
Seems highly disproportionate to me, unless they'd had a warning about it already.

The average 15 year old has easy access to sharp knives in their kitchen: when are we going to start prosecuting parents who don't lock the cutlery drawer?

It is indeed unfair. Entrapment sounds about right. Some words of advice should have been the end of the matter.

(I know we shouldn't generalise, but there is also the thought that the 15-year-old boy who has an interest in the wares of Ian Allan and buys its goods isn't really your typical gang member looking to tool himself up...)

I would like to know who else they targeted in Lower Marsh and elsewhere. I am extremely suspicious of why they were picked on and entrapped.

Too traditional, too middle class......too white.

Why did the bookshop had to pay a victim surcharge of £181. Who was the victim/

I have no sympathy for the shop because they have an obligation to provide training to their staff on how to identify under age customers. This training had not been carried out.
What we don't know is how many other 15 year olds have already bought knives from this shop unchallenged, the word gets around the street very quickly.

Speedy Tool Hire got fined 10 times the amount -£50K when Lambeth Council carried out the same operation there.

As for the racist comment "too white" the moderators should hold their head in shame for allowing such a ridiculous comment, to appear on this noticeboard.

I agree with Gavin

Fisher friend wrote:

As for the racist comment "too white" the moderators should hold their head in shame for allowing such a ridiculous comment, to appear on this noticeboard

No-one needs to hang their heads in shame, it's a public forum. Nothing wrong with hearing from people with different views to your own. I don't see boroughonian's angle on this but that doesn't mean it should be censored.

Anyway back to the subject - I go in that shop fairly often and it's such a gentle place full of pensioners. They do, however, sell quite a lot of sharp tools so should be on the right side of the law. I would have hoped Lambeth took a constructive, helpful approach with the dwindling number of local shops though, rather than leaping straight to prosecution.

I agree with Boroughnian's last sentence but would add 'too easy to entrap' and prosecute.
I use the shop regularly and was astonished to read of the prosecution and tried to workout what sort of knife or 'blade' had been sold to a child. I could only think of craft knives, not the sort of knife a young gang member would buy, and show, with bravado, to other gang members, or use to stab or kill an enemy gang member.
To be honest I have never seen an unaccompanied child in the shop.
I am told that the knife was part of a craft model cutting set which consisted of a green cutting mat approximately 7X5 and the 'knife' which was about the size of a slim-line fountain pen with a blade about as big as a fountain pen nib. It must have been the chosen buy of the entrapment team because it was so innocuous and incongruous. The young purchaser was tall for his age, having bought the craft set he left the shop and in less than a minute the Lambeth version of the Stasi burst into the premises demanding to see the manager, who was on holiday, and thus the prosecution followed.

The whole episode reeks of entrapment, deliberate entrapment. A young man buying the least likely looking 'blade', the enforcing officers from Lambeth hiding out of view on the street waiting for their decoy to exit the shop and then checking his purchase before bursting into the shop and demanding to see the manager.

A friendly warning would have been more than sufficient.

The shop is closing on 31 October.

edit: which I saw was already in News about 10 seconds after posting.

I will be sad to see the closure of Ian Allan's, my favourite shop on Lower Marsh. I haven't been able to use it since lockdown but am determined to do so before it closes. I will miss seeing Rosa and Kerry, two of the friendliest efficient and helpful staff on the street, make that 'the most'.
I suppose the new tenants will be another coffee shop, bar or fancy restaurant that I will. as a local, never use.
Perhaps my dream of there being so many of the above, swamping us, they will destroy each other leaving the street barren and empty with the unhygienic street food sellers gone too.
Office workers you can now take your own sandwiches to work and avoid the possibility of food poisoning and Covid-19 and save money.
Once the street becomes barren the greedy landlords would have to reduce their rents and shops that the local community would use can move back in. Local butcher, greengrocer, haberdashery, radio/TV, jewellers, shoe shop, fish and chip shop, women's clothes, men's clothes etc.etc. because after all this is primarily a residential area and did, not so long ago, support such a variety of shops.

I wish all the staff at Ian Allan's a happy, successful and contented future.

Such a shame, my fault, I never went in there but must've spent an age gazing in the window man and boy. I complained when the pet shop went!

For the record, racism is what I was attempting to identify. Our councils are rife with it, in my view.