Food Safety Legislation

New food hygiene laws came into force from 1 January 2006. They affected all food businesses, including caterers, primary producers (such as farmers), manufacturers, distributors and retailers. Food business operators must comply with the provisions of Regulation (EC) No. 852/2004 enforced by the Food Hygiene (England) Regulations 2006 which also contain Temperature Control requirements and the provisions of the Food Safety Act 1990.

How the legislation affects you will depend on the size and type of your business. Each food business operator must take a risk based approach towards food safety and implement a food safety management system. This involves assessing the risk to food safety at all stages of the business from receipt to sale and where possible removing the risk or at least reducing the risk to a minimum. The food safety management system should be based on the HACCP principles (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points). You must now keep up to date documents and records relating to your procedures.

More information about the regulations is available on the Food Standards Agency website. Further information is also available about the Safer Food, Better Business, Safe Catering and Cooksafe and Retailsafe schemes. These are designed to help caterers comply with the laws. The Safer Food, Better Business pack has been developed by the Food Standards Agency, working with catering and retailing businesses, to be practical and easy to use. Using this pack will help you to:

comply with the regulations;
show what you do to make food safely;
train staff;
protect your business's reputation; and
improve your business, e.g. by wasting less food.

The following Safer Food Better Business packs are available:

A hard copy of the 'Safer Food, Better Business' packs listed above can be obtained, free of charge, by calling 0845 606 0667, or by email.

Changes to Food Hygiene Training

There is a requirement that the person responsible for developing and maintaining the food safety management system has received adequate training in the application of the HACCP principles. This may be gained through experience and previous knowledge, however if this is not sufficient, a formal training course is available called Implementing Food Safety Management Procedures.

As before all food handling staff should have received adequate training, or be instructed and supervised to ensure that food is handled safely. If your business is involved in the handling of high risk foods such as meat products, dairy products, fish or shellfish, we recommend that the staff obtain the Level 2 Award in Food Safety in Catering (formally known as the Foundation Certificate in Food Hygiene).