'We just have to take their word for it': Pubs and restaurants say they have no choice but to trust customers who say they're from one household as they blast Covid Tier 2 lockdown rules as 'not practical' to enforce
Pubs and restaurants in London say they have no choice but to trust that their customers are abiding by new lockdown restrictions, blasting the rules as 'not practical' to enforce.
A host of venue bosses have today spoken of the difficulty in making sure the guidelines - which forbid friends from different households meeting indoors - are being followed.
One insisted: 'We don't want to be the Stasi' while others joked about whether they should be expected to check mortgage deeds or examine house keys to determine if groups of people arriving for food and drink actually live together.
The capital's new 'tier two' restrictions came into force on Saturday but seem to have been ignored by many, with scores of diners gathering in groups to eat at Westfield shopping centre today.
Londoners are now banned from social meet-ups with friends and families in any indoor setting unless they live together or have formed a support bubble with them.
This includes venues such as pubs and restaurants as well as private homes.
However, the warnings appear to have fallen on deaf ears, while businesses in the city - already on the brink of closure due to the lockdown - say policing which households come in 'is not their job'.
David Garcia, 45, operations manager of Arma, a Middle Eastern restaurant in Soho, central London, said he is not going to be the one to tell people to keep to their own household or refuse to serve them.
'There's been a direct and immediate impact,' he said.
'We were doing really well on weekends because the area was getting busier and now we are down 50 per cent from last week.
'When it came into place we took half of what we took last week.'
People enjoy lunch today indoors at the Westfield shopping centre in Stratford, East London
Two women enjoy a spot of lunch at the Westfield shopping mall in Stratford this afternoon
David Garcia, 45, pictured, operations manager of Arma, a Middle Eastern restaurant in Soho, central London, said he is not going to be the one to tell people to keep to their own household or refuse to serve them
How businesses are suppose to police the new regulations is not clear, according to the Spanish national who has been running Arma since it opened in 2018.
Mr Garcia said: 'The only way you can do it is to ask if people to prove where they live and it's not practical at all, and I'm also wondering about the legality of that.
'What are you going to ask for? A driver's license?
'So we just assume people are from the same household.
'I mean we can ask them but you have to take it by word of mouth and you have to trust that they are not lying to you.
'But I mean I go to restaurants on my days off and you can tell it's not happening.
'From a business point of view I don't think anybody is in a position to turn people away and I don't believe it's our job to police what household you come from.
'For us it's easy because we have a big seating area upstairs with enough space.
'Restaurants who have groups of four or six cannot be asking if they are from the same household because they can't afford it.'
Businesses are also expected to turn down customers who do not have an appropriate face covering.
Many restaurants in Soho, usually one of London's busiest places, appear to be bracing for a tough winter.
Today diners were sitting outside, most on their own or just two people, in the usual bustling area of the capital.
Jeremy Joseph, the owner of G-A-Y in Soho said the first weekend since the capital was in Tier 2 was the 'weekend from Hell' with plummeting numbers of customers.
Mr Joseph, who earlier this month launched a legal challenge against the government's 10pm curfew, said: 'The biggest changes are having to make sure people are in the same household, which is obviously impossible because how can we do that? We are asking the question but we have to rely on people telling the truth.
'There's no guidelines on whether the onus is on the venue or the customer.
'It's ridiculous because people don't want to come out as they don't know if they will get turned away.
'We have not been given enough guidelines or support, the stress at the moment is so high because the government is relying on us to get it right. There's so much pressure, it is affecting the mental health of us and all the the staff.
'Lots of people don't have their address on their ID, I don't have my current address. Students often have their parent's address, so it just isn't policeable.'
Lesley Lewis, landlady of Soho institution, The French House, which has been trading for over 120 years, said: 'We don't want to be the Stasi.
'If they say they are in the same household, I'm not going to argue with them.
'We are not going to ask them to show us their keys to see if they are matching.'
Batu Isiksalan, pictured, director at Prix Frixe Brasserie, said he had seen a lot of large groups cancel bookings since Saturday
People sit on tables indoors at the food court inside Westfield in Stratford, East London
Batu Isiksalan, director at Prix Frixe Brasserie, said he had seen a lot of large groups cancel bookings since Saturday.
The 50-year-old said: 'Tier 2 is very difficult, we have had a lot of cancellations because of the new restrictions, birthday parties larger groups have called to cancel.
'My prediction is that some restaurants will decide to close voluntarily because they won't have the customers to support their staff and costs.
'We were already around 50 per cent down on the number of customers before, now in the few days since Tier 2 started we are down around 50 per cent of that.
'Hospitality has been seen as a resilient industry and that if one place closes, someone else will take their place, but it's going to be hard to come back from this.
'Tier 3 is going to be even worse, bars will be able to close and get the £3,000 support, but restaurants won't be forced to close and so won't get any help.
'We are stuck in the middle, we have to stay open, but have no support.'
Francesca Polledri, 25, general manger of Little Italy in Soho said her family-owned restaurant has brought in a form for diners to sign stating they are in the same household.
She said: 'Because of the household rules customers now have to sign a slip declaring they are in the same household.
'We are not going to check their mortgage deeds so if they say they are in the same household we trust them and take their word for it.
'That way we have covered ourselves.
'It's only been a couple of days and we are usually quiet on a Sunday, so it is hard to judge our customer levels, but the whole area is really quiet compared to even a normal Monday.
'Just walking around there's so fewer people. It doesn't look good for the future.'
People eat their lunch and read a book indoors at Westfield in Stratford this afternoon
People enjoy lunch indoors at Westfield shopping centre in East London this afternoon
The first weekend of the new lockdown saw up to 75 per cent of tables cancelled, and West End operators said today the measures mean 'pretty much a systematic closure of the sector' with some bar owners warning their industry was 'completely f***ed'.
However there were claims that multiple households flouted the ban on not mixing indoors at pubs over the weekend despite the strict new measures since Saturday.
Witnesses claimed they saw people hugging and saying 'haven't seen you in ages', while some businesses admitted they do not know how to enforce the latest rules.
But some of those following the rules across the capital piled into beer gardens over the weekend where up to six people from multiple households can still gather.
It comes as market research firm Springboard said shopper numbers at British retail destinations dropped for the fourth week in a row amid the stricter lockdown rules.
The capital was placed into a tier two lockdown on Saturday, meaning it is now illegal for Londoners to socialise indoors with people outside their household.
Michael Kill, chief executive of the Night Time Industries Association, told the London Evening Standard: 'It's been horrendous, it has decimated the sector.
Shopper numbers at UK retail outlets fall for a fourth straight week
A market research firm said shopper numbers at British retail destinations fell for a fourth straight week following tougher government measures.
Springboard said total shopper numbers, or footfall, fell 3.1 per cent in the week to October 17 versus the previous week.
The figure was down 2.8 per cent on high streets, down 3 per cent in retail parks and down 3.5 per cent in shopping centres.
Springboard director Diane Wehrle said: 'The additional Covid tiered restrictions had an immediate impact on footfall in retail destinations last week with an across the board week on week decline.'
Footfall in the North of England and Yorkshire region fell 5 per cent, reflecting the tighter restrictions there. The year-on-year decline in UK shopper numbers worsened to 32.3 per cent.
'We are going to see some catastrophic results in terms of businesses deciding to close. It's so shortsighted, people are trying to stay open and survive but the Tier 2 mechanism means a pretty much a systematic closure of the sector.'
Des Gunewardena, chief executive of the D&D London restaurant group, said Saturday was a 'disaster' for its West End restaurants Quaglino's and 100 Wardour Street - with both seeing a 50 per cent drop in custom compared with the previous Saturday.
Greg Marchand, chef-patron of Frenchie Covent Garden, said it did 430 covers last week, 215 forecast for this week and only 71 expected next week.
And Rob Pitcher, the boss of Revolution Bars, said sales in its London bars on Saturday dropped 60 per cent compared to the week before.
Today, around 300 people from the hospitality industry protested outside Parliament to demand extra financial support amid fears of mass redundancies.
Soho, famous for its nightlife, was pedestrianised when the UK lockdown began to lift at the start of summer so its eateries and bars could set tables up in the street.
Some workers told of a drop in customers compared to the previous weekend, but said it could be down to the falling temperatures rather than the latest measures.
One member of staff at the Greyhounds Pub on Greek Street said he now had to ask everyone sitting inside if they came from the same household.
'I ask them but it's just not practical, I have no way of checking unless I ask everyone to give me their address,' said the man, who did not wish to be named.
A waiter at L'Antica Pizzeria Da Michele on Old Compton Street said they could no longer take bookings as a result of the changes, and relied on walk-ins.
Empty tables in a pub in London's Soho yesterday as people opt to sit outside instead
A bar worker serves drinks to two people sat indoors at a pub in Soho in London yesterday
Plenty of room for people to sit inside at a pub in London's Soho district yesterday
People sit outside restaurants and pubs in London's Soho district yesterday evening
People enjoy a meal outside in Soho last night after London was put into a tier two lockdown
Soho was also busy yesterday afternoon as people from different households sat outside
Despite that, Marcelo Teixeira Moraes, 24, said the restaurant had been at its 'busiest for months' on Friday.
'People were grabbing the chance to go out all together while they could, it was so busy I couldn't keep up,' he said.
Door staff at Comptons, a nearby pub, said they were also having to rely on people's honesty when it came to ensuring customers inside were from the same household.
One employee said they had been very lucky so far in terms of customer numbers, but were worried about what would happen when the weather turned colder.
Earlier in the day, anti-lockdown protesters marched down Oxford Street before congregating in nearby Leicester Square to demonstrate against the restrictions.
Led by Piers Corbyn, brother of former Labour leader Jeremy, protesters yelled at passers by to remove their masks, and telling them any vaccine would be 'poison'.
Many of those on the march headed to Soho's pubs at the end of the demo.
Meanwhile a market research firm said shopper numbers at British retail destinations fell for a fourth straight week following tougher government measures.
The hospitality industry has raised the grim prospect of 750,000 job losses across pubs, restaurants and hotels by February next year, as they protested in London today
Hundreds of hospitality workers take part in a demonstration in Parliament Square today
Springboard said total shopper numbers, or footfall, fell 3.1 per cent in the week to October 17 versus the previous week.
The figure was down 2.8 per cent on high streets, down 3 per cent in retail parks and down 3.5 per cent in shopping centres.
Springboard director Diane Wehrle said: 'The additional Covid tiered restrictions had an immediate impact on footfall in retail destinations last week with an across the board week on week decline.'
Footfall in the North of England and Yorkshire region fell 5 per cent, reflecting the tighter restrictions there. The year-on-year decline in UK shopper numbers worsened to 32.3 per cent.