FSA crime hotline going unanswered after meat scandal
A key hotline for staff at food processing firms to report food crime went unanswered during working hours just weeks after claims of widespread rule breaches at a large meat processor.
The Food Crime Confidential line, run by the Food Standards Agency (FSA), is for whistleblowers at firms in England, Wales and Northern Ireland to report incidences of crimes such as misrepresentation and substitution of food, as well as document fraud.
Yet, the hotline – one of two ways the FSA has said crime should be reported – was not answered during working hours on 1, 2 and 3 April, according to claims made by the Association of Independent Meat Suppliers (Aims).
Aims staff tried the number on two further occasions this week and it was answered by an operator once and went to answerphone on the other occasion.
A spokesperson for the FSA said that recent interruptions to the phone service were likely to have been a result of technical difficulties, which were now resolved.
The lapse follows allegations first published by Farmers Weekly that a meat processor, which cannot be named for legal reasons, had frequently been relabelling substantial amounts of imported pork as British.
Andrew Meredith | Farmers Weekly
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