Christchurch restaurant Lotus-Heart handed $20,000 fine for traffic light system infringements
The Lotus-Heart on St Asaph St.
WorkSafe has issued $20,000 worth of infringement notices to a Christchurch restaurant for failing to comply with Covid-19 requirements.
- WorkSafe는 코로나 요구 사항을 준수하지 않은 크라이스트처치의 한 식당에 $20,000 상당의 벌금을 부과했습니다.
It said The Lotus-Heart, a vegetarian restaurant on St Asaph St, had failed to display signage in a prominent place signalling whether it requires My Vaccine Pass use or not.
- St Asaph St에 있는 채식 레스토랑인 Lotus-Heart는 My Vaccine Pass(마이 백신패스) 사용이 필요한지 여부를 알리는 표지판을 눈에 잘 띄는 곳에 표시하지 않았다고 합니다.
The restaurant also wasn't displaying a QR Code in a prominent place, and didn’t have systems or processes to check My Vaccine Pass status of patrons, WorkSafe said.
- 또한 레스토랑은 눈에 잘 띄는 곳에 QR 코드를 표시하지 않았으며 고객의 My Vaccine Pass 상태를 확인하는 시스템이나 프로세스도 없었다고 WorkSafe는 말했습니다.
The restaurant had 28 days to pay three infringement fees totalling $20,000.
- 이 식당은 28일 동안 3건의 위반에 해당하는 총 2만 달러를 지불해야 했습니다.
It is the second Covid-19-related financial penalty – and the first restaurant – handed out by WorkSafe since the country moved to the traffic light system. Auckland martial arts gym Oliver MMA was slapped with a $12,000 fine earlier this month for failing to comply with the Covid-19 Protection Framework.
Simon Humphries, WorkSafe’s head of general inspectorate, said WorkSafe had been looking into the business since September, and the infringement notices were the result of an unwillingness of the business to engage with WorkSafe or change their practices.
“Despite the business refusing to communicate with us, our inspector has gathered enough information to determine the business isn’t meeting even the bare minimum of what it’s supposed to do,” Humphries said.
Because the business was continuing to operate as a dine-in restaurant, workers were required to be vaccinated, he said.
The vaccination status of staff had not been determined but if the business was found to be non-compliant in this area a separate infringement notice could be issued, he said
“I’m sure other hospitality businesses in Christchurch will be disappointed to learn about this business, but it’s not a reflection of the overwhelming majority of restaurants across the country who are working hard to look after their patrons.
“I know the hospitality industry has been needing to time to consider what the new rules mean for them and I want to reassure them we’re not jumping straight to infringement notices.
“It takes a sustained period of observed non-compliance for us to escalate which is what’s happened with The Lotus-Heart,” he said.
If a business failed to pay infringement fees, it could be referred to the courts for further action, WorkSafe said.
Concerns were earlier raised about the restaurant on social media, after customers noticed staff were wearing exemption card lanyards instead of masks in “some sort of co-ordinated effort”.
A commenter on a Reddit post said the restaurant was one of their favourite places to get a vegetarian meal.
“When I learned this I felt pretty put off from going back there during the ongoing pandemic,” they wrote.
Another wondered if the restaurant was as “blasé about hygiene and food safety requirements as they are about Covid requirements”.
A Stuff reporter visited the Lotus-Heart in late October, and said no staff at the vegetarian restaurant and health store were wearing masks, and many were wearing exemption cards as lanyards.
The Lotus-Heart owner Bhuvah Thurston declined to comment at the time, and trespassed all members of The Press from her restaurant. She could not be reached on Wednesday.
The restaurant reopened on St Asaph St in July 2011, with an adjoining health shop and music store, after its Cathedral Square and Colombo St stores were destroyed in the 2011 earthquakes.
The restaurant was born out of Thurston’s association with Sri Chinmoy – an Indian spiritual teacher – and staff are “students” of his, Thurston previously told Stuff.
All staff meditate, and when preparing food they are conscious that energy will affect what they create, she said.
Sri Chinmoy was an ultra-marathon runner who believed in people transcending their capacities through running.