There is ONE place left on the Advanced HACCP course which is being held in Edinburgh from the 22-24 September 2014. Don’t miss your chance as this course is only held annually. If you wish to book a place please contact Jackie McCabe, jm@ without delay.

A booking form is attached.

I am delighted to welcome a report written by Community Food and Health (Scotland), or CFHS, detailing the views of 12 trainers delivering the REHIS Elementary Cooking Skills course. CFHS provided funding to 13 groups for them to deliver the course in low-income communities. A lack of cooking and practical food skills is often cited as a major barrier to healthy eating.  To address this, REHIS, in partnership with NHS Forth Valley Nutrition and Dietetics Department and with support from Community Food and Health (Scotland) and Edinburgh Cyrenians, developed a new course called Elementary Cooking Skills. The course aims to provide participants with basic cooking skills with the aim of increasing their confidence, skills and knowledge. A copy of the CFHS report can be found by clicking on this link – Elementary Cooking Skills Course

We now have many centres throughout Scotland approved to run this course.  For more information about the REHIS Elementary Cooking Skills Course, and or other REHIS qualification, please contact me at jm@

Jackie McCabe

Director of Training

Colin Wallace, REHIS President, gave oral evidence to the Scottish Parliament’s Health and Sport Committee at Holyrood during discussion on Stage 1 of the Food (Scotland) Bill. The whole report, published on 21 August 2014, is available at the following link –  Food (Scotland) Bill

The Annual Conference has given the Institute’s members, colleagues from partner organisations and government agencies and the wider Environmental Health and Public Health communities including REHIS Approved Training Centres the opportunity to meet and to discuss important and topical issues. A great deal of effort has gone into making Annual Conferences relevant and informative for delegates but delegate numbers continue to fall year on year. The Institute’s Council is keen to hear your views on how best to present its Annual Conference and invites you to complete and return the short questionnaire at the following link – REHIS Conference Survey

Thank you for your assistance.

Tom Bell

Chief Executive

Falkirk Council scooped the top awards when more than 70 of Scotland’s ‘greenest’ people attended the REHIS sponsored Scottish Green Apple Environment Awards 2014 recently. Falkirk Council scored a stunning hat-trick of success, winning Local Authorities Gold awards for two of their submissions – ‘The Helix’ and the ‘Greenspace Initiative’. On the strength of that double-whammy, they went on to win the top accolade – Green Champion of Scotland 2014.

The presentation ceremony was staged at The Scotsman Hotel, Edinburgh and the trophies were presented by Sophie Desbrow, Miss UK Green Queen. Other category Gold winners included Dundee City Council, Transport Scotland, Balfour Beatty, Richard Murphy Architects, Kier Infrastructure & Overseas,  J. Murphy & Sons, Forestry Commission Scotland, Healthcare Environmental Group, Wind & Cloud Travel, and Clyde Shopping Centre.

REHIS Senior Vice-President Martin Keeley shared the Master of Ceremonies duties, and he commented: It was a great honour to be able to recognise and reward some of Scotland’s greenest councils, companies and communities in this way. We heard some inspirational stories of how organisations have greatly improved their environmental performance, and it is gratifying to see that this is still a top priority for many of the country’s leading players. We wish them the best of success with their continued efforts.

 All of the Scottish entries now go forward with the possibility of winning an additional UK Green Apple Award, which will be presented in the Houses of Parliament, London, in November.

The Green Apple Awards are also one of the few schemes acting as an automatic feeder scheme into the Brussels-led European Business Awards for the Environment, so all winners have the chance to represent their country in that prestigious campaign.

 They will also be invited to help others to help the environment by having their winning papers published in The Green Book, the world’s only annual work of reference on environmental best practice that is distributed free of charge all over the UK and around the world through embassies, environment professionals, central and regional government, universities, reference libraries and the media.

 If they agree to help others to follow their lead, they then become Green World Ambassadors and collect additional trophies and certificates and if that were not enough – the overall top scorer also wins a free holiday for two in Aquacity, Slovakia the world’s greenest resort. All of this is organised by The Green Organisation, an international, independent, non-profit, non-political, non-activist environment group dedicated to recognising, rewarding and promoting environmental best practice around the world.

Recently Keep Scotland Beautiful has presented a case to TESCO to receive funding from the single use carrier bag charge in Scotland to support work in communities.  Having been shortlisted from hundreds to participate in a public vote and as the only Scottish charity in the final three KSB is asking friends and supporters to take a minute to vote and share this message across their networks.

Please vote for Keep Scotland Beautiful to make a difference in the places people love. 

VOTE NOW HERE: www.tescoplc.com/bagyourvote.

 For more information visit www.keepscotlandbeautiful.org/bagsofopportunity.

World Environmental Health Day

26 September 2014

26 September has been declared World Environmental Health Day by the 

International Federation of Environmental Health. This year’s theme is Addressing Environmental Health Inequalities.

Full details available at http://www.ifeh.org/wehd/index.html

Training Adviser(Food Safety/Health and Safety)

I am delighted to announce that Raymond Hubbocks has been appointed to the post of Training Adviser (Food Safety/Health & Safety). Raymond, currently a member of the Institute’s Council and a Lecturer with Forth Valley College, will take up his post on 30 June and we look forward to welcoming him to the team.

Photo caption: Raymond Hubbocks with Her Royal Highness, The Princess Royal in April last year

Tom Bell

Chief Executive

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has published its annual accident and injury statistics for 2009/10. The new figures confirm that Britain has the lowest rate of fatal occupational injuries in Europe and one of the lowest levels of work-related ill health. In Britain between April 2009 and March 2010 there were 152 workers fatally injured (down from 179 in 2008/09), 26,061 major injuries (down from 27,894) and 95,369 injuries serious enough to keep people off work for three or more days (down from 105,261). Full details available on the HSE website www.hse.gov.uk/press/2010/hse-statistics2010.htm.

CIVIC GOVERNMENT (SCOTLAND) ACT 1982

Section 44(1)(b), 2  and Schedule 1

Licensing of Skin Piercing and Tattooing Conditions

LOCAL AUTHORITY IMPLEMENTATION GUIDE 

Version 1.7 

Scottish Licensing of Skin Piercing and Tattooing Working Group May 2014

The Civic Government(Scotland)Act 1982(Licensing of Skin Piercing and Tattooing)Order 2006 introduces a mandatory licensing scheme for practitioners operating in Scotland who carry out any form of skin piercing or tattooing, and also for premises from which any of these practices are offered. The purpose of this licensing scheme is to introduce a national regulatory framework for the industry, ensuring consistent controls are put in place to manage and reduce the risks to public health arising from these activities. Responsibility for inspection of premises and enforcement of the new licensing scheme will be with the Environmental Health Department of your Local Authority. To assist with the implementation of the order an implementation guide has been compiled that details best practice information to assist officers in making decisions at a local level. This is seen as an open document and is available to download. In addition full national licence conditions have been compiled that have been adopted by each of the thirty two local authorities to again ensure consistency. They are also available to download. The general licence conditions cover the following: General state of repair of the premises. Physical layout of the premises. Waiting area requirements. Treatment area requirements. Cleaning, disinfection and sterilisation arrangements. Arrangements for waste and sharps disposal. Operator and equipment requirements. Client information, consent forms and record keeping.

I would like to introduce myself as the Institute’s new Director of Training following the retiral of Graham Walker in March 2014.  Graham will be much missed, having been part of REHIS for many years, but I am confident that I will step up to the challenge to continue to strengthen the Institute’s Community Training activities.

I would also like to welcome Angela Flynn, Administrative Assistant, to the team who will be supporting Margaret O’Hare. Angela replaces Marlene Wood who retired in April after over 10 years with REHIS. Both Margaret and Angela will continue to offer the same high standard of service which you have come to expect.

Our training centres have been tremendously busy with an enormous amount of courses being delivered – thank you!  A victim of this success is that the certificates are taking a little longer than normal to process and again I thank you for your patience.

Many of you I have met in person, but there are equally as many that I have not and I look forward to meeting you at the Annual Trainers’ Update in October, if not before.  However, if you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact me on  jm@.

Best Wishes

Jackie McCabe

The John Craigs Student Award was introduced to commemorate the life of the late John Craigs and his meritorious service to Port Health. The winner of the award will receive a cheque for £200 and will be invited for an all expenses paid day at the APHA conference, where the award will be presented.

Students are invited to submit a dissertation or portfolio demonstrating their knowledge, skills and experience in an aspect of port health. Full details of the award and how to apply can be found by downloading the attached document. All entries are to be submitted to VCameron@hssd.gov.gg by 30 June 2014.