Category: News Item

Five companies face charges under the Health and Safety at Work Act following an outbreak of Legionnaires disease in Edinburgh.

The outbreak in 2012 saw four people die and 92 cases identified. The source of the outbreak was never identified and the Crown ruled at the time there was no evidence to justify any prosecution.

The charges are connected to alleged breaches of health and safety regulations and are unrelated to the deaths.

North British Distillery, Macfarlan Smith, Ashland Industries, Pera Services and Chemtech Consultancy are accused of exposing people to the risk of legionnaires between 2009 and 2013.

It is alleged the companies failed to ensure the safety of employees and members of the public from the risk of exposure to legionella bacteria from cooling towers at property in Wheatfield Road.

At the city’s Sheriff Court legal representatives of the companies pleaded not guilty to the indictment.

Sheriff Alison Stirling was told the trial could last up to 12 weeks. A further hearing will be held on 25 January next year. No date has been set for the trial.

From 2018, food businesses in Europe will have to take steps to cut down on acrylamide- a carcinogenic chemical produced by food in high temperatures.

The European Commission voted to introduce measures to tackle acrylamide in July this year, pending confirmation from the European Parliament and the European Council. It has now announced that both of these bodies have signed off and new legislation has been published to come into effect in April 2018.

Acrylamide was first discovered in foods as recently as 2002. It forms naturally during high-temperature cooking and processing. This includes frying, roasting and baking, particularly in potato-based products and cereal-based products, according to the Food Standards Agency (FSA).

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) confirmed in 2015 that acrylamide is a carcinogenic substance and that current levels of dietary exposure to it indicate a concern to carcinogenic effects.

Although it is not possible to totally eliminate acrylamide from foods, actions can be taken to try and ensure that levels are as low as reasonably achievable. Food businesses will be required to put in place practical steps to manage acrylamide within their food safety management system under the new EU legislation. The legislation describes practical measures based upon best practice guidance developed by the food industry to mitigate acrylamide formation in a range of foods.

Food Standards Scotland and FSA are working with the British Hospitality Association and other key stakeholders to develop simple guidance which will help the catering and food service sectors comply with new rules.

In addition, the FSA has been undertaking surveillance on acrylamide levels in food products since 2007. The latest surveillance report can be found on the Survey of acrylamide and furan in UK retail products page.

FSA’s advice and more information about the chemical can be found by clicking here.

Revised guidance has been published for businesses on how to improve protections for food and drink supply.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) and the British Standards Institute have published a revised guide for food businesses on how to improve protections for food and drink supply.

The guide has been published to help provide user-friendly advice to businesses on the steps they can take to strengthen resilience in their operations from a range of potential risks.

The latest version of the Publicly Available Specification guidance titled ‘PAS 96:2017 Guide to protecting and defending food and drink from deliberate attack’ has been jointly sponsored by the FSA and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

It uses risk management strategies which can be adapted to operations of all sizes at different points in the supply chain. It also provides advice on how businesses can detect potential vulnerabilities and the steps that they can take to mitigate them.

The Waste and Resource Action Programme (WRAP) has published new labelling guidance, to give consumers more consistent storage and date label advice.

The guidance has been prepared by WRAP, DEFRA Labelling team and Food Standards Agency (FSA) in conjunction with Food Standards Scotland, FSA in Wales and FSA Northern Ireland with input from various food sector trade bodies.

It will be used by food manufacturers, retailers and brands as the industry standard and brings together recommendations that ensure food is safe and adheres to legal requirements, with best practice information to ensure it is stored and used within time.

The document provides guidance on how to apply and use food date labels and how UK law applies throughout the “life cycle” of a food product. The guidance explains how adopting some practices, while maintaining food safety, can reduce food waste. These practices include:

• Only applying “Use By” where there is a food safety reason to use it
• Maximising product “open” and “closed” life
• Only applying “use within x days” open life where there is a specific safety reason not already covered by a “Use By” date.
• Providing clear advice on where to store the product to maximise product life
• For products that require or benefit from chilled storage apply consistent advice
• Using the “snowflake” logo to indicate where products are suitable for freezing
• Only having one date label on a single product

The move is to help tackle the two million tonnes of food wasted each year in UK homes purely from it not being used in time. A third of this food waste is triggered because of how shoppers interpret existing date labels.

During the recent UN Environment Assembly in Nairobi, more than 200 countries pledged to eradicate pollution on the planet, committing their countries to honour efforts to prevent, mitigate and manage the dangerous levels of pollution affecting the ecosystem and the health of billions of people around the world.

The three-day assembly held on 4-6 December, was attended by over 4,000 heads of state, ministers, business leaders, UN officials and civil society representatives.

The assembly ended with environment ministers issuing a declaration titled “Towards a pollution free planet”. The declaration commits nations to targeting pollution through tailored actions to shift societies towards more sustainable lifestyles, promoting fiscal incentives to move markets and enforcing stricter laws on pollution.

If the pledges of all the countries are met, 1.49 billion more people will breathe clean air, 480,000 km (or around 30 per cent) of the world’s coastlines will be clean and $18.6 billion will be spent on research and development and on innovative initiatives to tackle air, land and water pollution

Dr. Edgar Gutiérrez, Minister of Environment and Energy of Costa Rica and President of the 2017 UN Environment Assembly, said: “The science we have seen at this assembly shows we have been so bad at looking after our planet that we have very little room to make more mistakes”.

“With the promises made here, we are sending a powerful message that we will listen to the science, change the way we consume and produce, and tackle pollution in all its forms across the globe”.

During the assembly, the countries also passed 13 non-binding resolutions with more specific measures on issues such as marine litter and microplastics, air pollution, poisoning from paint and batteries, and pollution in areas hit by conflict and terrorism.

Overall, environmental degradation causes nearly one in four of all deaths worldwide, or 12.6 million people a year, and the widespread destruction of key ecosystems. Air pollution is the single biggest environmental killer, claiming 6.5 million lives each year.

Particular focus was given on ocean plastic pollution. Vidar Helgesen, Norway’s Environment Minister, who initiated the resolution to eliminate ocean plastic pollution revealed how Norway has already seen the impacts of plastic pollution on its seas. He said: “We found microplastics inside mussels, which is something we like to eat. In January this year, a fairly rare species of whale was stranded on a beach because of exhaustion and they simply had to kill it. In its tummy, they found 30 plastic bags”.

Erik Solheim, head of UN Environment, showed excitement for both the declaration and the resolutions. He said: “ We have put the fight against pollution high on the global political agenda. We have a long struggle ahead of us, but the summit showed there is a real appetite for significant positive change”

Lorrainne MacGillivray has been installed as the REHIS President for the coming year. Drew Hall, who stood down as President, handed over the Chain of Office at the Institute’s Annual General Meeting on 17 November in Edinburgh.
Congratulations to Lorrainne and we wish her all the best in her new role.

Scotland leads the way for public health with the UK Supreme Court backing the Scottish Government imitative of minimum unit pricing for alcohol.

The Supreme Court justices unanimously dismissed the appeal brought by the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA) and other drinks manufacturers, who argued that the policy was “disproportionate” and illegal under European law. The Supreme Court ruled that the proposed minimum unit pricing policy is appropriately targeted, lawful and proportionate.

This ends five years of legal challenges and delay since the Alcohol (Minimum Pricing) (Scotland) Act 2012 was first passed by Scottish Government to address a health crisis responsible for 1,265 deaths in 2016, an increase of 10 per cent on the year before.

The Scottish Government says this is linked to alcohol being 60 per cent more affordable than in the 1980s, with wide ranging costs to public health.

Its current MUP proposal of a 50p per unit charge means four 440ml cans of five per cent strength lager would cost at least £4.40, a 12 per cent bottle of wine would be at least £4.50 and a 70cl bottle of whisky must cost at least £14.

The Scottish Government hailed Wednesday’s unanimous ruling, which it said had “global significance”. 

Modelling from Sheffield University shows a minimum unit price of 50 pence is estimated to result in, 121 fewer deaths per annum by year 20 of the policy and a fall in hospital admissions of just over 2,000 per annum by year 20 of the policy.

Scottish Health Secretary Shona Robison will set out the timetable for implementation to MSPs “shortly”, but said of the judgment: “This is a historic and far-reaching judgment and a landmark moment in our ambition to turn around Scotland’s troubled relationship with alcohol.

Prior to implementing the policy, Ministers will now conduct a consultation on the proposed 50 pence per unit price and refresh the Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment (BRIA) that is required by Parliament.  The Scottish Government anticipates setting the minimum unit price at 50 pence per unit, subject to the outcome of the consultation and the refreshed BRIA.

Total Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Scotland reduced from 17,370 megatonnes (Mt) in 2015 to 12,372 Mt in 2016, continuing the overall reduction trend that has been seen in Scotland since 2007.

The figures are contained in the annual Scottish Pollutant Release Inventory (SPRI), published online by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA). SPRI is an electronic database containing details of all pollutants over the reporting threshold emitted to the environment from sites regulated by SEPA. The tool can be accessed here.

The two largest contributing pollutants in terms of number of sites reporting and emissions are carbon dioxide and methane, the largest one being carbon dioxide, and these drive the overall Greenhouse Gases (GHG) trend. The largest contributor to a 29% decrease in Carbon dioxide emissions from Scottish industrial sites in 2016 was the closure of Longannet Power Station.

The other four GHG pollutants Nitrous Oxide, sulphur hexafluoride, hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons have far fewer reporting sites, so the annual emissions and overall trend are much more sensitive to changes at individual sites. These can include sites closing or starting, an increase or decrease in production capacity and volumes, operational or monitoring changes, accidental releases, economic factors etc.

The primary objective of SPRI is to make emissions releases and waste transfer information available to the public, while fulfilling European reporting requirements of the European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register Regulation. The information is provided by individual operators and SEPA publishes it online to provide policy makers, academics and the public with information on the type and quantity of pollutants released by operators.

SPRI provides a valuable picture of the amount of pollutants released in Scotland, but it is not a league table and does not display the "best" and "worst" performers across the country. Figures relate to mass emissions and not concentrations, so they cannot be directly linked to health, air or water quality standards. SEPA regulates these releases ensuring they are within health and environmental standards.

The UK’s largest salmon processing company has recently become approved by the Royal Environmental Health Institute of Scotland (REHIS) to deliver top quality Food Safety and Hygiene training with a commitment to rolling it out to each and every member of its workforce.

The 200,000 square foot site, with a workforce of almost 600, situated in Rosyth, Fife, is now registered as a REHIS Approved Training Centre for REHIS training courses in Food Hygiene.

The company prides itself on having food safety at its very core and believes that investing in the workforce education will bring continued success to the business. 

The management team at Marine Harvest recognise that cutting edge machinery may be purchased by anyone, but individual skills, talent and experience cannot be bought.  Individual skill sets are being nurtured and developed to create a formidable and high performance work force, which is key in keeping Marine Harvest as the market leader in the salmon processing industry.

The six hour elementary syllabus that covers a full range of food safety fundamentals has been further enhanced to meet Marine Harvest specific needs yet comply with REHIS regulations.

David Bett – Quality Manager, and Course Presenter at Marine Harvest, worked closely with Harry Degnan (Degnan Quality & Food Safety LTD) in developing the course content.  Harry brought a wealth of knowledge from his lengthy food industry experience. Whilst David was keen to make the course as relevant and effective as possible for employees by incorporating examples of Marine Harvest controls, policies and procedures which promote food safety and good manufacturing practices.

Video clips demonstrating real life examples of poor standards are shown which highlight key issues and emphasise the importance of fundamental issues such as, barrier control, traceability, and good standards of hygiene.

The course itself was presented to Jackie McCabe (Director of Training at REHIS) prior to the course going live.  It was then subsequently quality assessed by Raymond Hubbocks (Training Advisor for REHIS).  The feedback from Raymond was very complimentary with comments such as "first class", "good group interaction" and "good use of media resources" all mentioned in the report.

It is not only the Marine Harvest’s workforce who benefit from this training as they aim to make a positive contribution in the community, and recently welcomed staff from local business “Marini’s” in Rosyth to join one of the training sessions.  They also found it relevant and valuable which demonstrates the diversity the course content delivers. 

The photo shows David Bett and Jackie McCabe with some of the Marine Harvest workforce receiving their REHIS Elementary Food Hygiene Certificate.

The Royal Environmental Health Institute of Scotland (REHIS) have submitted a comment to the Scottish Parliament on the petition lodged to urge the Scottish Government to ban the sale and use of glue traps and boards in Scotland, for consideration by the Committee. 

Glue traps are indiscriminate and can cause prolonged suffering to any animal caught in them. The indiscriminate nature of these traps was illustrated by the recent case of a female blackbird discovered by a customer at a pet shop in Inverness. The bird while trying to escape pulled off one leg and most of her feathers on her tail and underside.

Guidelines state that these traps should be checked frequently and any caught animal should be killed by a swift blow to the head. At present there is no regulation over these devices and are for sale to the public and their use is not monitored to check compliance with guidelines. 

Glue traps and boards are currently banned in Ireland, New Zealand and the Australian state of Victoria. UK wide petitions for the banning of glue traps and boards have been launched, which indicates the public’s desire for control of use and sale of glue boards. Therefore, it is thought, if the Scottish Government agrees to ban these products this will set an important precedent for the rest of the UK to follow suit.

REHIS submitted the following response:

“REHIS recognises the need for control of use of glue boards in pest control. We consider that they are open to misuse, can entrap non-target species if used incorrectly and cause unnecessary suffering to target species. There are, however, cases of last resort, where other control measures have failed and there is no alternative to the use of glue boards. We would support the removal of glue boards for sale to the amateur sector and their restriction for use to the professional pest control sector. In addition, their use within the professional sector needs to be controlled so that only trained and competent personnel can use these products in accordance with a strict set of guidelines.

The Pest Management Alliance has recently updated a Code of Practice for the Humane Use of Glue Boards in consultation with DEFRA which could provide the basis of either a Statutory Code of Practice or a licensing scheme similar to the bird control licensing scheme operated by Scottish National Heritage to preserve public health, public safety and prevent the spread of disease.”

A food business operator who was jailed after a customer died from an allergic reaction to a curry has failed in a bid to have his conviction overturned.

Paul Wilson, 38, from Sheffield suffered a severe anaphylactic shock in 2014 after eating a takeaway containing peanuts from the Indian Garden in North Yorkshire.

Mohammed Zaman, 53, was found guilty of manslaughter by gross negligence and six food safety offences, but was cleared of a charge perverting the court of justice. He was sentenced to six years in jail.

In Zaman’s appeal, lawyers argued he did not have a fair trial and the jury was “misdirected” during the judge’s summing up of the case.  However, the Court of appeal in London ruled his conviction was safe and rejected the appeal bid by Zaman to have his sentence cut.

Lord Justice Hickinbottom who sat with Mr Justice Openshaw and Judge Michael Topolski on 8^th November dismissed the appeal saying:

“We are in no doubt that the conviction was and is safe.” He also said that Zaman was responsible for negligent behavior that “persisted over months”. He continued to say: “In our view, his negligence in this case was not just gross, his behavior, driven by money, was appalling.”

Since December 2014, takeaways and restaurants have been required by law to make customer aware if any of the 14 allergens are ingredients in their food. Mr Wilson had died before that change in the law, but the trial heard he had specified “not nuts” when he ordered and his meal had been labelled as “nut free”. The court heard that his allergy was so severe it could be triggered by him being close proximity to a peanut.

Zaman had cut corners by swapping the thickening agent almond powder for the cheaper groundnut powder which contained peanuts trying to save money because his business has debts of £300,000.

Zaman was also found to still be selling “nut-free” curries containing peanuts on the day after tragedy. As the next day following the death, a trading standards investigator went to the premises and asked for a nut free meal. Tests revealed that the meal contained a “sizeable amount” of ground peanuts comparable to the levels found in Mr Wilson’s curry. This shows his blatant disregard for public safety.

An investigation was also started by trading standards a week before Mr Wilson’s death and had warned staff at the takeaway that they had to tell customers their meals contained peanuts after a different customer suffered an allergic reaction at another of Zaman’s restaurants.