Five year old girl fined $200 for selling lemonade

A five year old girl was fined £150 after selling glasses of homemade lemonade for 50p from a makeshift stall. The stool was set up in Mile End, Tower Hamlets as thousands were on their way to Lovebox festival in Victoria Park.

Five years old?! I don't know about you but I was definitely not well versed in trading license law at the age of five, and I'm not sure enforcement officers should have expected me to be.

Here's what happened: a little girl set up a lemonade stall to hydrate festival-goers in a London park last weekend. Four law enforcement officers went up to the girl and her father, Andre Spicer, and read from a lengthy legal notice. The officers explained that because she was trading without a license, she was basically breaking the law. The officers wrote out a £150 (almost $200) fine for these actions, which would become a higher penalty if not paid within 14 days.

A trading licence is basically just a piece of legal information giving permission to carry out a particular trade. Generally speaking, it’s illegal to make any kind of sale without having one. That's just to check that you're not selling something illegal, or have some questionable activity on your record which would make it dangerous to allow you to sell people stuff.

But in this case, it feels like one those times where the rule isn’t quite appropriate for the situation… in other words, it’s probably better to just use some common sense. The actions of the five-year-old were clearly innocent and not intended as some kind of massive fraudster scheme.

Plus, she wasn’t harming anyone – in fact, she was doing her bit to contribute to the community. The officers who gave out the fine should have recognized that there is a clear difference between this young girl’s lemonade stand and an unlicensed street trader, and therefore, hard-handed actions were really, really unnecessary.

Plus, surely we should be encouraging kids with entrepreneurial ideas to pursue them? Harsh conduct by enforcement officers that lack common sense could stop children from expressing creativity and taking initiative in the future. This girl literally went home crying – not sure she'll be starting another business anytime soon. Sure, officers are there to enforce the rules What's this? , but a bit of moral judgement in specific situations is pretty important too.

Mr Spicer, who works at Cass Business School, was fortunate enough to have the platform to write and complain about the fine. As soon as the local council found out what had happened, they cancelled the fine and a full apology was issued to the girl and her family. A council spokesman said he expected the enforcement officers, in the future, to show “common sense and to use their powers sensibly”.

This girl had a dad who happens to be a professor working on organisational behavior, had the prestige and confidence to write to the council and remove the fine. Not everyone would know their rights and have the correct resources to deal with this issue. So, from me to you, law enforcement people - use your common sense next time!