STREET traders were targeted in a city centre swoop after an M.E.N. investigation.
A hit squad confronted all traders on Market Street after we revealed that one stallholder was using bogus customers to drum up business among the unsuspecting public.
City centre councillor Pat Karney, who led the operation, said that the number of traders had grown so much that the street, which is the busiest in the north west, was like a "Moroccan bazaar".
Coun Karney was accompanied by Gordon Reid, from the City Centre Management Company, Andy Scragg, from the licensing department, and two trading standards officers. They asked all traders to produce their licences.
Mr Reid said he had received a high number of complaints from the street's genuine retailers.
'Market stalls'
Mr Scragg said: "A lot of people pick up passes from police stations for just é12.50 that give them the right to trade for a year due to an old bylaw.
"But they do not allow people to set up what is effectively a market stall here and wait for custom, which many do."
The clampdown was welcomed by some Market Street shopkeepers.
One woman said: "It's about time something was done. A few of them stand in front of my shop and scare people with their shouting and touting for business.
"Lots of folk cross the street to avoid them and we miss out on potential business."
Mr Scragg said the council was looking into following the lead of councils in Newcastle and Westminster, which have introduced Acts of Parliament to stop the validity of the passes on their streets.
He said: "It's worked there but it is a costly process and can range from é70,000 to é170,000."
Coun Karney backed the call for an Act of Parliament but said clampdown operations could clear the way for the official traders to be the only stalls working on Market Street.
Bargain
He said: "A lot of people say customers know what they are getting into when they buy this stuff from traders in the street. But that is not always the case.
"It's human nature to hunt for a bargain and plenty of folk don't realise that they have absolutely no rights as consumers when they make purchases.
"Aside from that, some traders I have spoken to pay no income tax, and a couple have only been in the country for a month."
Despite not having the power to evict the traders, Coun Karney said letters warning of prosecution had been handed out and traders should be taking its threats seriously:
He said: "Today's operation is just the start of things. Rest assured, these streets will be cleaned up."
ARE you pleased a crackdown has been launched on illegal traders? Have your say.
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When we go on holiday we enjoy this way of selling. Are we not being pompous because it is our city centre.
Any chance you can rid of the bubble guys on Market Street?
Now they are seriously annoying, I am completely fed up with ducking and weaving on my way home 5 times a week!!
Just wanted to say that I am absolutely delighted that the council is finally doing something regarding the street traders on Market Street. They give the area a bad image, and counteract all the good work that is being done to improve the city centre. The sooner they are removed the better.
The only question is, why did it take so long? Those traders have been there for years. It might have been an idea to take someone along from the DSS and the IND, too.
Why is it when there is bad publicity in the newspapers that the "big guns" come out to be photographed as if they are actually doing something ? Isn't Market Street inspected and why weren't these scruffy stalls closed then ? If these stalls have been around for a long time under the noses of trading standards officers on Market Street, then they can get away with it anywhere !
About time too - these people are just peddling cheap nasty tat and their presence just serves to exacerbate the scruffiness that is Market Street: only on reaching Marks and Spencer does the area start to become respectable.
Hopefully this gang of scruffs will be banished for good.
any chance of getting rid of the market reserchers? I am sick of running the gaunlet in order to avoid them !!!
So glad they've got rid of them and agree about getting rid of the market researchers!
Market Street is too busy at the best of times without having to manouver round a dodgy stall to get past!
If they want to trade, they should set up a genuine stall in the market area, if people want the goods, they'll go and but them!
Get rid of all of them, tat traders, bubble man, pestering women market researchers, people mithering me to go to their hair salon and part with money on the street to a complete stranger! And there's timeshare con artists out there too! (She stands in front of M&S every day! Be warned!)
You cannot walk down Market Street these days without being harrassed! The experience of walking to and from my office every day and at lunchtime is seriously annoying!
Note to all:
1. No I do not have a dog for your survey
2. No I do not want to come to your hair salon for your 'great offers'
3. No I do not want to enter a competition for shopping vouchers only to be telephoned and bugged into buying a timeshare!
4. No I do not want to buy your cheap tat!
5. No I do not want to sign up a direct debit to your charity
6. I am not going to be damned in hell for all eternity, so Jesus Army, please leave!
And I think I speak for so many here!
It's not just dodgy street traders that need a crackdown and not just in the city centre. There are two other hazzards to pedestrian areas, cars parking on them and shopkeepers putting their goods outside and causing an obstruction. Shops are for selling, pavements for walking.
Yep, remove the lot, im sick of having bubbles fired into my face, and watching kids having henna tattoos is a disgrace, they are many dangers involved with henna.
Get rid, they are a pain.
Surely we are a market town/city? That is where the name comes from ""Market street"" So why not regulate the legal traders and clamp down on the bogus ones,that way the innocent traders are not bundled in with the bad traders?? Dont let us loose all our street traders ,this is what gives a city a nice feel "European????""
Cllr Pat Karney is not an elected member for the Manchester City Centre but represents Harpurhey and lives in the Ancoats & Clayton Ward.
He does have responsibility as the council's spkesperson on city centre issues.
Perhaps City Centre councillor is misleading in the strictest sense of a description.
The perfume traders near market street stop are the worst, i observe their trick everyday, young man wearing red baseball cap walks up, sniffs the perfume, hands over a tenner while crowds watch, trader hands over bag with freebie thrown in, young man walks off, crowd come forward and hand over cash for perfumed water, young man comes back 5 mins later hands bag back and trader hands tenner back!...process starts again few mins later!
all the time crowds gather standing with backs to tram lines and narrowily miss being flattened by tram coming round bend!
and those gospel/hip hop religous singers! well.. accident waiting to happen!
I raised this problem with council 5 months ago and only now do they come out in a blaze of PR.
M/cr council what joke.
Further to yesterdays story regarding the 'crackdown' on Market Street. Last evening at 5,00pm on leaving Spring Gardens there were five carts still peddling tat - some crackdown! Send the police in to arrest and deport the whole lot of them
Have to agree with Ace Riley and Mike. This kind of activity adds character to a city centre.At least these traders have a smile on their faces,unlike the commuters!!