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Coffee sometimes paid workers with food and was used to smoke shisha...
A cafe once frequented by Princess Diana, and named in her honour, could lose its licence after employing illegal immigrants.
The bar was also used illegally for smoking shisha.
Shortly before her death in 1997, Princess Diana had sent a touching letter to the cafe owner, which read: “I wanted to write to you personally, to thank you very much for the beautiful flowers you sent me for my birthday.”
Abdul-Basit Daoud, the owner, recalled with nostalgia how Diana first visited the cafe a few days after it opened.
"She herself drank cappuccino, ate cake, croissants, something like that, but sometimes she also ate English breakfast," the owner recalls.
Dozens of photographs of the princess adorn the walls, including one she herself donated, as the cafe is now a popular tourist destination.
But the Ministry of Interior has now requested that the bar's license be revoked.
During four inspections between 2019 and 2024, seven illegal workers from Albania and Egypt were found.
The basement was also being used illegally for smoking shisha.
One immigrant had been employed there for more than two years, according to an immigration enforcement report.
Other workers said they received food instead of wages for their work.
This "raised concerns about the exploitation of labour on the premises of the building".
A chef was found to have been "paid in food" and had arrived in the UK on a business visa that expired in 2015.
Owner Daoud oversaw recruitment, checking the work eligibility and immigration status of new staff members.
He told officers that staff were paid in cash and some received free food in exchange for working in the cafe.
The inspectors' report stated: "Café Diana was found to be employing illegal workers. This business has clearly failed to meet the objectives of crime and disorder prevention, as well as public safety."
As a result, the cafe was fined £135,000 in April for illegally employing three migrants.
Customers were also found smoking shisha in the basement during a police search. They seized 45 unlabeled boxes of shisha tobacco.
Lawyers for the cafe owners said in a letter to the council that “immediately upon becoming aware of the reported problems, our client took swift and decisive action by evicting the tenant responsible for the unauthorized activities.”
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