Fruit and vegetable wholesale tenants at London’s Borough Market are under threat of being kicked out of their trading home of more than 1,000 years.
The Borough Market (Southwark) Trust has issued a “see you in court” ultimatum to tenants who refuse to leave, or to accept “impractical” reductions in their trading space.
Tenants’ association chairman Andrew Sugarman said: “My family has traded from this site for more than half a century and if it ends like this, it stinks. The majority of the income the board of trustees makes is the rent of the tenants of the market. Yet they see fit to use that money to beat us around the head.”
Fruit and vegetables have been traded in the community, close to London Bridge, since the 11th century. “Eight years ago, we were asked to give our long-term commitment to the market when times had been tough and there was a lot of upheaval,” Sugarman said.
“We did that. Our willingness to co-operate with requests for the overall good of the market - without insistence on written confirmation, and often to the detriment of our own businesses, has come back to bite us.”
Sugarman and his fellow wholesalers started receiving letters 18 months ago, he claimed, and in October 2009, wholesalers were given two months notice to quit.
Two of the remaining five wholesale tenants have already effectively been forced into leaving the market - C&C Fruit Co closed its doors at the end of June and L Booth will vacate its premises at the end of August. Now the trustees have rejected a group offer to settle the dispute by the three tenants who wish to continue trading from the site.
The wholesalers argue it would be impossible to operate a sustainable market environment if there were less than three traders in tandem, as markets thrive on competition.
Sugarman also said chairman of the board of trustees, Peter Wilkinson, had refused to meet with him. “It is easy to speculate what they want to achieve, but that’s all we are able to do,” Sugarman said.
“If his vision for the future of Borough Market does not involve wholesalers, he should have the courage to face up and tell us that. Every meeting request I’ve made in the last two years has been put into the hands of his solicitors.”
In a statement to FPJ, a Borough Market spokesperson said: “Far from losing our wholesale offer, we are committed to improving it and as such we need to ensure that all traders fulfil their obligations as part of the Borough trading family.
“As a free-standing charity with important community commitments, we have to be confident that all our traders are operating on a level playing field.”
It is thought around 50 jobs could be lost if the wholesalers and even some retailers who are threatened by the action were to close their doors.
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