Bid to make information compulsory in restaurants

RESTAURANTS, cafés and take-aways in Scotland should be made to display certificates showing how well they did in hygiene inspections.

That is one of the recommendations in the first assessment of the Food Hygiene Information Scheme pilot, an initiative to drive up standards among food outlets and improve information available to consumers.

The review found that nearly four out of 10 businesses who were issued with "improvement required" notices did not display them, compared to eight out of ten which passed inspections.

In addition, just 5% of customers questioned knew about the scheme and around 70% did not think it was possible to check the food hygiene status of retail or catering outlets in their area.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) Scotland, which is behind the initiative, is now set to launch a major awareness campaign to improve consumer knowledge of the scheme. Peter Midgley, head of food law enforcement at FSA Scotland, said that they had drawn up plans for advertising the initiative in each of the areas where it is being piloted.

"We really didn't want to be promoting the scheme until it was properly bedded in," he said. "The big piece of work that we will be carrying out between July and October will be public awareness raising.

"We would hope to see a measured improvement in public awareness as a result of that campaign."

The scheme, which is running for two years in parts of Perth, Renfrewshire, Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Fife, involves issuing premises with certificates saying "pass" or "improvement required". An "awaiting inspection" notice is also available for new businesses.

Latest figures show that out of a total of 2664 premises in the pilot areas, more than 70% have been awarded with a "pass", with around 14% given "improvement required" notices. The remainder are awaiting inspection or are exempt from the scheme because food is only a small part of the business.

The independent assessment, which has been carried out six months into the project, recommended that it should be continued, but notes that caterers and retailers are not forced to display certificates indicating their hygiene status. Among the recommendations made is that the FSA Scotland should consider making the scheme compulsory.

However, Midgley said that it was too early to say how the initiative would be taken forward, adding that there was no legal framework in place for making it compulsory.

"We are at a stage now where we are very pleased with the results showing us that the scheme has actually had very high acceptance from businesses and consumers," he said. "That is a very good starting point, but it is too early to say how the pilot projects will be taken forward at this stage and it will depend on what we find as the pilot progresses."

Mary Lawton, food policy manager at the Scottish Consumer Council, which had campaigned for the introduction of the scheme, said that they would back making the scheme enforceable in the future.

"Originally people thought businesses would be against it and in fact they weren't," she said. "There is proof out there from other countries running such initiatives)that standards have gone up - for example in Los Angeles they found food poisoning cases declined.

"I think in the long-term we would be in favour of making it compulsory."

In Fife, around 500 premises have taken part in the pilot scheme so far. Alastair Shaw, intervention manager at Fife Council, said the scheme had been "universally popular" and was now being extended to a further 3000 businesses to include all food premises in the area.

"Probably the only thing we have had, in terms of negative comments, is from people in the area not covered by the scheme as to why they can't get it for their own premises," he said. "That is one of the reasons why we are extending it.

"We are not waiting for the pilot to finish, as we are sufficiently convinced of the benefits that we are happy to roll it out."