THE owner of a fish and chip shop has been fined more than £4,000 after Swindon Borough Council brought ten charges against him relating to ten food hygiene offences on his premises from March this year.

Mohammed Asif, 45, pleaded guilty to all ten offences in connection with Lemon Plaice fish and chip shop at St Andrew's Ridge when he appeared before magistrates this week.

Asif had previously failed to attend court on October, 12 and as the offences couldn’t be dealt with in his absence a warrant without bail was issued.

He was brought into custody on Wednesday and attended court. He did not want to see the duty solicitor and he pleaded guilty to all 10 offences.

A spokesman for the council said Asif had told magistrates that he was new to the business which he thought would be easy but it was harder than he thought and had relocated from Birmingham to start the business.

At the time of the inspection Asif who lives with his family above the shop, said that business was not good and he was not making any money. He therefore did not have the money to rectify the problems. He said he is now going bankrupt.

In relation to the dirty conditions in the premises, he said the inspection was carried out when the shop was busy and so things had been spilt.

But he said they always cleaned up every night.

When asked about the dirty floor, Asif replied that he did not prepare food on the floor.

He said the council had recently carried out another inspection and he had replaced the floor tiles himself. He then apologised for the state of the premises.

Asif was fined £100 for each offence. It would have been £150 but he was given credit for his early guilty plea.

Asif was ordered to pay costs of £3,128 (£1,326 legal costs and £1,802 environmental health costs) plus £20 victim surcharge and £180 court charge totalling £4,328.