Food Hygiene fine

A Midhurst store has been fined £11,000 and made to pay costs of nearly £4000 following breaches of food hygiene legislation.
During a routine food hygiene inspection, Officers of Environmental Health Services found mouldy food for sale within the store. Council Officers also found that the company had failed to implement and maintain their food safety management systems, which are designed to ensure that all food sold is safe to eat. The Council wrote to the company telling them of the failings to comply with food hygiene legislation and gave them a date to rectify the problems by. In line with usual practice, lots of help and assistance was offered by the Council to the company. However, during a further visit by Officers of the Environmental Health in January 2009, the same problems were found to exist.
The Deputy Leader of the Council at Chichester District Council, says: "We are very supportive of businesses and we always go the extra mile to explain their legal responsibilities and to assist them with specialist advice. Our role is in education and improvement. However, we do take breaches of food hygiene legislation very seriously and when we see insufficient improvements being made, we will prosecute anyone who is found to be contravening that legislation. "In the vast majority of cases, the Chichester District is a source of fine food, through its many restaurants and public houses, national food retailers and more unusual local specialist food suppliers. Our Commercial Safety Team regularly inspect premises within the district to ensure that all food is safe to eat and prepared in clean and well run establishments."