Last updated at 13:35, Monday, 20 April 2009

Finding rat, mice and cockroach infestations in restaurants hasn’t put Carlisle’s food safety tsar off eating out.

Ruth Harland

Ruth Harland has seen some gruesome sights that would turn even the strongest of stomachs after 34 years working as an environmental health officer.

But she says people power has brought about a massive change in attitudes, making it safer than ever to eat in Cumbria’s restaurants, pubs and takeaways.

The Scores on the Doors scheme was adopted by every local authority in Cumbria in 2007 to let the public know how clean their local chippy or a la carte restaurant was behind the scenes.

A maximum of five stars can be awarded by food safety officers and anyone can see the ratings on the internet.

There are 937 businesses listed in the Carlisle district and 126 of these have got five stars.

Ms Harland said: “It’s great from the consumer point of view because it allows them to make an informed choice about where they buy their food and eat out.

“It’s all about attitudes. The scheme has been going long enough now for people to know what they need to do to improve.

“There are still 10 premises that have no stars and I think some people just don’t want to make the improvements.

“It’s laziness, a lack of understanding and, in some cases, a lack of finance. I’d be reluctant to eat at a premises with no stars.”

Allerdale council has 918 businesses, including supermarkets, listed under the scheme. Ninety of these have five stars.

In Copeland, there are 444 on the website and nine with five stars. And Eden has 56 businesses with the highest rating, out of 791 listed.

Those premises awarded three to five stars get a certificate to display on the door. The highest rating requires common sense standards such as wiping down surfaces, not mixing raw and cooked meat and regular hand washing. Businesses also have a documented food safety management system.

“It’s brought about an improvement and we’ve seen a reduction in the number of high-risk premises,” Ms Harland said.

“The number we used to have to inspect every 12 months has reduced by 50 per cent. Because of the improvements they’ve made, they’ve moved up to 18-monthly inspections.

“The general standard has been lifted.”

The Carlisle Scores on the Doors website gets 1,500 to 2,000 hits a month and the figure peaks in the summer as tourists flood into the county.

So successful is the scheme, it’s due to be extended to every local authority in the country.

Without the environmental health officers, it would not work and if no checks were in place, standards would quickly fall says Ms Harland.

Food poisoning is often caused by salmonella and campylobacter. Both bugs are commonly found in chicken and studies estimate that at least 50 per cent of carcasses are contaminated.

Symptoms of diarrhoea and vomiting usually start to emerge 12 hours after infected food is ingested but it can take up to 10 days.

If a specimen from a sufferer tests positive for either condition, Ms Harland’s team is informed. In the last 12 months, 70 cases of notifiable poisonings like salmonella, have been reported in the Carlisle area.

It is up to the officers to find the source of the poisoning using their detective skills.

Ms Harland said: “One of my first cases was a woman in her 60s. She’d been very poorly and they’d been one or two other cases.

“We questioned people about what they had eaten during the incubation period of the disease, it can be hard to remember and people often wrongly think it was the last thing they’ve eaten.

“In this case, the common link was a fish and chip shop where we found a mouse infestation and droppings contaminating food.”

Carlisle City Council taxpayers spend £300,000 a year on one part-time and five full-time food safety officers.

Most of their time is spent on unannounced inspections at any premises dealing with food, including factories like McVities. These are not included in the Scores on the Doors scheme.

Their main role is to enforce the reams of food safety legislation and to protect public health.

How clean and safe a premises is dictates how often the officers inspect it.

When cockroaches infested a food business in the Carlisle area last year, it was voluntarily shut down after officers were tipped off by a member of the public.

Ms Harland said: “They’d had a pest controller in but it hadn’t worked and there were hundreds of them.

“They weren’t doing enough to control them and voluntarily shut for a deep clean. Once you’ve got cockroaches, they’re very difficult to get rid of, it’s about controlling numbers.

“We didn’t prosecute because the owners were doing something to control the problem.”

Food programmes on television have helped dining out to surge in popularity and it seems to be a treat that few are prepared to give up even in a recession.

She added: “People are less tolerant of dirty premises and now there are lots of places where customers can see the kitchens, which I think is a fabulous step forward.”

An estimated 50 per cent of food poisoning cases are caused by meals prepared in the home.

Many people have adopted bad habits such as washing raw chicken or using the same tea towel for days on end.

Ms Harland added: “If you’re bringing raw meat into your home, you should always assume it has germs on it.

“By washing chicken, you’re creating an aerosol that will spread bacteria. We suspect that barbecuing is one of the most common causes of food poisoning.

“Chicken should be pre-cooked before it goes on the barbecue.

“People on the whole are very careful but you should never allow babies to sit on work-tops or animals to climb on them. And you should always wash your hands.”

Despite a starting salary of up to £30,000, there is a national shortage of environmental health officers.

Applicants most have a degree-level qualification and they will not only deal with food but also pollution control and health and safety.

“Generally, people welcome us because we make it clear we’re there to help. We don’t want to take formal action against people because it’s a lot of hard work for us and shows we’ve failed with the business.

“What I love about this job is that there is something different every day. We don’t use a lot of high-tech equipment, it’s all about what you see and hear,” Ms Harland said.

Visit the Scores on the Doors website at www.scoresonthedoors.org.uk if you are thinking of dining out.

Anyone interested in a career as an environmental health officer should visit the website of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health at www.cieh.org.

First published at 11:21, Monday, 20 April 2009
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk