Billingsgate star trader Roger Barton sold out-of-date fish

 
P26 Roger Barton Pic:Graham Hussey
WEST END FINAL

Get our award-winning daily news email featuring exclusive stories, opinion and expert analysis

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

A Billingsgate trader who starred in a BBC documentary about the famous market has been fined more than £10,000 after some of his fish was found to be nearly three weeks old.

Roger Barton, 67, nicknamed the “King of Billingsgate”, has traded at the market for around 50 years and is famed for his straw boater, gravelly voice and no-nonsense opinions.

He pleaded guilty last Thursday at Thames magistrates’ court to four charges under food laws and was ordered to pay fines and costs totalling £10,756 relating to the sale of pollock, sea bream and hake.

Tower Hamlets environmental health team said that during an inspection in February last year they found some of his fish was between 18 and 20 days old and “not safe for public consumption”.

After a follow-up inspection, Barton was allowed to continue trading and no further offences have been found.

Barton, from Benfleet in Essex, owns Barton and Hart wholesale fish merchants, which operates as a sole trader, and he is one of the market’s most successful merchants. He has frequently appeared on comedian Alex Zane’s XFM radio show and was featured in last year’s BBC2 documentary, The Fish Market: Inside Billingsgate.

Billingsgate is owned by the City of London Corporation but environmental health inspections are undertaken by Tower Hamlets. A Billingsgate official said: “It’s an isolated case and we do take things like this extremely seriously.” Barton declined to comment.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT