BABERGH PLEASED WITH HADLEIGH BUTCHER’S GUILTY PLEA – COUNCIL SEEKS TO REASSURE PUBLIC THAT SUCH OCCURENCES ARE “VERY RARE INDEED”

Babergh District Council today (1st August) welcomed the £2000 fine (plus £1223 costs and victim surcharge) imposed on a Hadleigh couple who had pleaded guilty to placing meat on the market when it did not have the required health marks.

In March, working on calls from an employee and a local resident that Mark and Anne-Marie Rothwell, previously of Pierpoint’s Butchers in Hadleigh High Street, had taken possession of ten pig carcasses from a supplier other than a licensed abattoir, officers from Babergh’s Food and Safety Regulation Team removed the items before they could enter the food chain. At a hearing soon afterwards Sudbury Magistrates’ Court formally condemned the meat, which was then incinerated.

Babergh then took the decision to prosecute Mr and Mrs Rothwell, who had been running Pierpoint’s Butchers for four months at that point, for processing the meat – which amounts to ‘placing it on the market’ within the meaning of the law.

Mr and Mrs Rothwell were both fined £1000 each and ordered to pay costs of £596.50 each plus £15 victim surcharge each. The Magistrates felt that this was a “serious breach” of food hygiene legislation.

Emma Richbell, Babergh’s Senior Food & Safety Officer, welcomed the outcome of today’s hearing: “Babergh is pleased that Mr and Mrs Rothwell were found guilty. It is a fundamental requirement of this business that a butcher only receives animal carcasses that have been slaughtered in a licensed abattoir and which bear the appropriate health marks. This is to ensure that any meat is free from potentially harmful diseases or veterinary drug residues”.

Explaining that Babergh’s concerns and actions were designed to protect the public  regardless as to whether the meat was for public sale or, as claimed by Mr and Mrs Rothwell, for private use, Ms Richbell continued “Babergh is aware of many farmers who routinely send their own stock to licensed slaughterhouses which then goes on to butchers for cutting and return to the farmers. However, in this case the normal checks that are so essential to ensuring that such meat is safe were being bypassed”.

“The meat could potentially have gone into the wider food supply as it was clear to Babergh officers during their initial visit to Pierpoint’s Butchers that cuts from the pigs were being mixed up with that from other, licensed sources”. 

John Rainer, Babergh’s Food & Safety Regulation Manager, sought to allay the fears of the general public that this type of action might be commonplace.

“In my 28 years as an environmental health professional I have never come across a case where a butcher sought to bypass the use of a licensed abattoir for carcasses in their possession.  Food businesses in Babergh are run to high standards and I am confident that our established butchers would not even consider handling meat that has not been through the required legal controls”.