Immigration raids at UK burger chain prompts calls for boycott

Byron storefront / Photo courtesy of thefoodiecoupleblog (Manila Bulletin) LONDON – The arrest of dozens of staff from the upmarket British burger chain Byron by immigration officials reportedly tipped off by the management prompted an outcry and calls for a boycott on Thursday. The interior ministry confirmed that 35 people from Albania, Brazil, Egypt and Nepal had been arrested in several Byron restaurants in London on July 4 during “intelligence-led visits”. News about the raid spread on social media with the hashtag #boycottbyron trending on Facebook and Twitter. A protest of the restaurant by London-based NGOs is planned for August 1 outside a Byron branch in central London. “Our protest aims to shine a spotlight on this unethical behavior, deter it from happening anywhere else, and to support workers still working at the restaurants to resist exploitation,” the organizers wrote on the Facebook event page. According to a worker interviewed [...]