Food Crime unit announced | Food Safety Lawyer

As predicted on this blog some time ago, the government has today announced that a Food Crimes Unit will be set up in a response to the ‘Horsegate’ scandal which saw the recall of beefburgers and other meat products. 

See the article on this blog 4th March 2014 Elliot Review into Horsegate | Food Crimes Unit. 

The announcement of the Food Crimes Unit follows recommendations in the report by Professor Chris Elliot that was published IN June. Click here to down load the full report.

The report is based on eight pillars of food integrity which are:

• Consumers First: The government needs to work with consumers taking steps such as encouraging whistleblowing.
• Zero tolerance: To include mandatory food testing by manufacturers
• Intelligence Gathering: To be led by the Food Standards Agency
• Laboratory services; Encouragement of Centres of Excellence.
• Audits; Work with manufacturers to improve transparency
• Government support: Plenty of ideas but no evidence of cash.
• Leadership: Setting up the Food Crimes Unit under the auspices of the Food Standards Agency
• Crisis Managament: in conjunction with the Cabinet Office.

This recommendation was necessary as a the initial review discovered that although Food Crimes were of interest to a variety of regulators, non had any domain experience or viewed such offences as targets on their horizon. Hence the fact that, despite great public protest and concern, the investigation and prosecution of ‘Horsegate offences’ has hiterhto been somewhat of a ‘damp squib’…