Caffè Nero Successfully Defends Food Hygiene Prosecution

19/04/2016

Caffè Nero has successfully defended charges relating to breaching four counts of food hygiene regulations. 

The case came before a judge at the Wimbledon Magistrates’ Court after a woman swallowed an inch-long metal bristle when eating a panini in one of Caffè Nero’s branches and was forced to undergo emergency surgery.

Staff ignored food hygiene training procedures

Despite Caffè Nero’s policies, staff at the Putney High Street branch of the coffee chain ignored strict training procedures and brought in a wire brush to clean because they believed it was more efficient for cleaning the grill.

During the three-day trial, a number of staff admitted to using the brush and it was subsequently discovered that wire brushes were used in other branches of Caffè Nero including Clapham Junction, South London, and Boston, Lincolnshire.

Defending a charge of contravention or failing to comply with the regulations

If an individual or a company is charged with contravening or failing to comply with the Food Hygiene (England) Regulations 2013 (the Regulations) they have a defence if they can show, on the balance of probabilities, that all due diligence had been used to prevent the breach.

In R (Tesco Stores) v City of London Corporation, the Divisional Court held that for the defence to succeed, the accused must show, on the balance of probabilities:

'…[firstly] the establishment of an effective system to avoid the commission of an offence, that is the precautions have to be established, and secondly it has to ensure that the system it had established is observed and followed; that is to say it has to ensure an effective system and its effective operation. The statutory requirement is that all reasonable precautions and all due diligence be taken.'

A defendant may also rely on the statutory defence that the offence was due to an act or default of another person or reliance on information supplied by another person and following that they themselves had taken all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence to avoid the commission of the offence.  However, in order for this defence to apply the defendant must identify the other person to the prosecution at least seven days before the hearing.  If the defendant has previously appeared before the court, then they must identify the other person within one month of the first appearance.

The Court held that Caffè Nero had reached the standard set out in R (Tesco Stores) v City of London Corporation.

District Judge James Henderson said: 

“It is easy to think of other steps that might have been taken, but it seems clear that this was indeed indoctrinated into employees during various stages of their training.“In my view, Caffè Nero have made out the defence that they did indeed take all reasonable precautions and exercised all due diligence”.

The importance of establishing food hygiene policies and procedures

The law states that all individual food businesses must have in place ‘food safety management procedures’ based on the principles of HACCP (hazard analysis and critical control point).  These procedures need to be written down, updated when needed and records kept that can be reviewed by the relevant local authority.

To establish a defence if a staff member contravenes the Regulations, these policies and procedures must be communicated to all employees and adequate training provided.

By ensuring your company conducts adequate due diligence when it comes to complying with the Regulations, stiff fines and even imprisonment can be avoided.