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News & Links

Level 4 Award in Managing Food Safety in Catering or Manufacturing 8-12 September 2008. £549 including refreshments, exam entry and course book

We are ready to run a Level 4 Food Safety Course (formerly the Advanced Food Hygiene) in Mid Kent. If you are in a management role in the food industry and want to advance your training and career prospects contact us to join this course.

Ashford Meat firm "sold tainted meat"

An Ashford based meat firm McClaren Foods has been accused of selling unsafe meat to schools, govenment departments and top restaurants. Full story.

In this case the local authority where the depot was, Chelmsford, received a complaint from a member of staff and investigated but gave 10 days notice to the company that they would be visiting. Alot of local authority environmental health departments have this policy of not inspecting food premises without giving advance warning. What do you think? Should appointments be made by EHOs to inspection food businesses? Email us your opinions.

"A third of Yo! Sushi restaurants surveyed did not meet all the legal standards required of them"

In a survey by the Independent newspaper of restaurant chains, Yo! Sushi achieved two stars or less at a third of their restaurants similarly nearly one in five Pizza Huts were unable to achieve 3 stars in EHO inspections.

Read the whole article by clicking on this link.

The CIEH Level 3 Award in Supervising Food Safety Course

The CIEH has now replaced the Intermediate course with the Level 3 Award in Supervising Food Safety in Catering/Retail/Manufacturing, Kent Hygiene Solutions implementation of the new syllabus went well. Our trainer, Sally Newing, is pleased with the way the new course is going as were the candidates judging by their comments shown below:

"the teaching superb. My attention was always brought back to the task at hand"

"clear tutoring, very relaxed"

"Thoroughly enjoyed this course"

"brilliant tutor"

"carefully constructed in an enjoysble atmosphere"

"A very professionally run course"

"Very informative with a good teacher who made you understand"

And the results ......... 4 courses and a 100% Pass rate to date! Congratulations to Camille Boniface of the Snoring Owl, Geoff Parker of Jessell Farms, Alex Pollard of Eastwell Manor and Gary Belcher for achieving Merit passes.

**Contact us to enroll on the next course on the 17-19 September 2008 in Ashford, Kent.**

Fish & Chip Shop fined £2000 for not training staff

The "Angel" Fish & Chip shop in Lewisham, London has been fined for not training food handlers. Full story on CIEH site.

Scores on the Doors

All food businesses get inspected by local authority EHOs and up until now the results of these inspections has been a secret between the inspector and the business. All this is going to change! Restaurants, cafes, public houses and other food premises will have to display the results of food hygiene inspections or a score generated from the EHOs report, whether good or bad. In addition the score will be published on special websites accessible to the general public and the press.

Many boroughs councils have been running the scheme for several months and some parts of Kent, including Ashford, Canterbury and Tonbridge & Malling started 1st October 07 and the whole of London from 8th October 2007. Many more will be starting in January 2008, these include Maidstone and Sevenoaks . All these are piloting the Scores on the Doors scheme for the Food Standards Agency (FSA) and if it is successful "Scores on the Doors" will be rolled out across the UK in a single nationwide scheme. Some London boroughs and other councils in the the rest of the country are already running thir own schemes using different rating systems, but a unified star rating system is being proposed which would encourage businesses to improve standards.

Benefits to the public

It is hoped that the scheme will drive up standards of food safety within premises and give the public the opportunity to make an informed choice about where they choose to eat or buy food based on food safety and hygiene standards. They will have access to information they are legally entitled to receive in an easy to understand format.

Benefits to the food business

The scheme will serve as a good advertisement for those food businesses with high standards of hygiene, this in turn may lead to an increase in turnover and reward food business operators for their effort.

How the scheme works

When an Environmental Health Practitioner carries out a full food hygiene inspection, the food business is given a score for the standard of hygiene found during the visit. The score is used to determine how often a premise is inspected. The frequency of inspection is calculated using a national risk rating system produced by the Food Standards Agency.

The frequency of inspections for food businesses ranges from every six months for the highest risk businesses, to once every five years for the lowest risks businesses. From 1 January 2006 this score has also been used to calculate the star rating for the Scores on Doors scheme.

Each business is scored on the following criteria

· Food hygiene and safety procedures - How hygienically the food is handled including temperature control

· Structure - The condition of the structure, cleanliness, layout of the premises, lighting and ventilation

· Confidence in Management - The food business operators history of compliance with food hygiene law and evidence of a food safety management system

During the inspection each criteria is given a score, the total of all three scores then generates the number of stars given to a premises in the following way.

0* Very Poor

1* Poor

2* Satisfactory

3* Good

4* Very Good

5* Excellent

If you want to see the scheme in action visit the "Scores on the Doors" website, see link below.

Kent Hygiene Solutions clients have all moved up the Scores on the Doors Ratings; one premises moved from 2 stars to 5 stars, another from 1 star to 4 stars and another from 3 stars to 4 stars.

If you already know your star rating and want to improve or maintain it or if you want to be prepared for when "Scores on the Doors" goes live in your area then contact Kent Hygiene Solutions; we can help you to improve your star rating, please call 01233 811633 for an informal chat.

If you follow our advice and simple procedures you will get a better star rating - we promise!

Tesco Fined £36,000 for rat infestation

A severe rat infestation was found in a Tesco store in Hampshire. For full story visit the CIEH website

Your Mother told you not to bolt your food!

McDonalds serves up sausage and egg McMuffin with added extra! For full story visit the CIEH website

Hotel closed and fined for mouse infestation

A Bedford hotel has been fined £6000 and closed down for being overrun by mice.

For full story visit CIEH website

"This has been the best presented hygiene course I have attended"

Just one comment following a recent Level 2 Food Safety Course for Parkwood Hall School.

If you have sat through a hygiene course by some other providers recently could you honestly say that?

So if you are looking for interesting, topical and well presented food hygiene or health & safety training for your staff phone us for a quote - you will be surprised how affordable we are.

Butcher's boy loses arm in mincing machine

A butcher has been fined after a 15 year old boy lost part of his arm in a mincing machine. Full story.

"Safer Food Better Business"

Are you attempting to comply with the recent legislation by implementing Safer Food Better Business as your Food Safety Management System. If you feel you need extra help and your local environmental health department or their partner "consultants" seem unable or unwilling to provide it then contact the Kent Hygiene Solutions for the voice of experience from qualified environmental health practitioners.

Safer Food Better Business is now available in Chinese as well as versions designed specifically for Indian/Bangladesh catering. See the Food Standards Agency website (link below), contact your local authority or Kent Hygiene Solutions for more information.

Kent Hygiene Solutions are developing SFBB to make it more able to provide the "due diligence" defence that food businesses need.

Environmental Health Practitioners Wanted!

Kent Hygiene Solutions and our sister company Colin Hamer Associates are ambitious and expanding Environmental Health Consultancies that receive numerous approaches from prospective clients. We are always interested in hearing from well-qualified and competent environmental health practitioners who would like to join our team.

If you think that you have what it takes to become one of our associates please contact us for an informal discussion. Ring 01233 811633 and ask for Colin or Lynda.

Products

Kent Hygiene Solutions are very please to be able to offer exciting new products to assist businesses with maintaining food hygiene standards and health and safety requirements. We have recently teamed up with Testo Ltd to offer their range of thermometers, data loggers, pH meters and oil testers. Several of which can be bought on line. Please contact us for details and prices of the full range.

We have also started offering the FreshMarx range of food labelling systems, again these can be bought on line or contact us directly to discuss your requirements.