VANS 4 BUTCHERS

Once again the Food Standards Agency is playing around in the name and shame game by backing a star rating system for the food industry and who knows where the winners and losers will be. Some industry representatives are calling for a rethink of a pilot scheme that awards star ratings based on inspections by environmental health officers and are branding the system as flawed because it is too open to interpretation and could damn many compliant firms to poor ratings because of old information.

Naming and shaming is not a new game and indeed, many local authorities publish details of offenders on their websites. So be it if the information is about convictions for food hygiene cases where the operator has been found guilty by a court of law. The difference here is that the stars will be awarded for ‘robust food safety management,’ or for demonstrating best practice in managing and achieving.’

Just like beauty, these attributes are in the eyes of the beholder, but with this scheme there will be only one beholder who will have the power to decimate a business if it is not ‘beautiful’ enough. Environmental health officers are trained to uphold the law and to enforce it and generally do a good job, but how can they be considered the right ones to decide on best practice, particularly if it based on a short duration visit.

Over the years, the Federation has seen many reports sent in by members who are seeking advice on its contents. Certainly, in some there have been obvious breaches of the law, but many of the issues raised are not legal requirements, they are good practice and that will vary at the whim of the EHO. We call them “the musts and the shoulds”. The “must” is a strict legal requirement and the “should” is a ‘do it if you want to.’

Surely best practice is something for the proprietor to determine based on the likelihood of many years in the business. Best practice will vary from business to business and it would be a shame for the owner to change his best practice to the EHO’s best practice just to gain an extra star. It could also be dangerous to do so if the staff try to follow the new best practice rather than the old established best practice without proper training in the new methods. Are you still with me???

The original idea for this system came from Holland where every business would receive a certificate of inspection backed by an accreditation scheme giving businesses that passed the inspection a gold, silver or bronze standard. That however, applies to businesses rated higher than the minimum standards required by the law and is not dissimilar to the “Shop With Assurance” scheme operated by the Federation which some years ago combined with a similar scheme in Scotland to create the Guild of Q Butchers.

The big difference is that these schemes are voluntary and are based on consistent standards with a regular inspection team. They are generally promoted as marketing tools by PR companies rather than enforcement tools by competent authorities like the FSA.

This scheme could aggravate relations between firms and enforcement officers to the best interests of neither party and frankly, do the public really care that much? They go to a particular premises, particularly a small business, not because it has lots of stars which generally means higher prices, but because they know and trust the owner who’s very existence depends on selling safe food to them.

Oct 2006 – Source: NFMFT