Meat hygiene inspectors strike for fair pay

Meat hygiene inspectors, vets and support staff are embarking on two days of strike action from today in a long-running dispute over pay.

Two four-hour walkouts are scheduled to take place, from 6.30am-10.30am on Tuesday, August 26, and again on Wednesday, August 27.

The decision follows a ballot earlier this month, which saw UNISON’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) members overwhelmingly vote for strike action over an imposed pay offer of just 0.75%, while most other public service workers have been offered a 1% increase.

UNISON has previously invited the FSA to resolve the pay dispute through independent conciliation. Even as late as last week, UNISON asked them to reconsider and go to ACAS for arbitration, but they refused.

Dave Watson, UNISON Scotland’s Head of Bargaining and Campaigns, said: “Meat inspectors, official veterinarians and support staff cost each person in the country just 38 pence per year. When you consider that since April 2012, they have prevented over a million instances of diseased animal carcasses from entering the food chain, it’s a small price to pay for safer food.

Deregulation of meat hygiene inspections will result in tragic consequences, warns UNISON

Tuesday 10 June 2014

UNISON, the union which represents meat hygiene inspectors in abattoirs and meat plants, today (Tuesday, 10 June) warned MSPs that any deregulation of meat hygiene inspections will result in unsafe meat entering the food chain, with potential tragic consequences.

A recent freedom of information request revealed that since April 2012 meat inspectors and vets have prevented over a million instances of diseased animal carcasses from entering the food chain. This included:

·         659,000 instances of the Liver Fluke parasite

·         427,000 instances of pneumonia in red meat carcasses

·         100,000 instances of adult tape worm

·         100,000 tumours in chickens

·         1100 instances of parasitic lung worm in cattle, from entering the food chain.

Dave Watson, head of UNISON bargaining and campaigns, said: “This shows what a vital job meat inspectors do. We are calling on the Scottish Government to ensure that Food Standards Scotland is focussed on safety of consumers not food industry profits. Meat inspectors and vets must be able to carry out thorough independent inspections, free from food industry influence.”

Why we should worry about food safety

THIS summer our newspapers have been full of stories about healthy bread, sausages and the risk of sugary drinks, to name but a few. While healthy eating is important, UNISON Scotland's Dave Watson takes a closer look at what’s happening earlier in the food chain in this article in the Scotsman. http://www.scotsman.com/news/food-safety-must-come-ahead-of-profit-1-3048451

UNISON challenges supermarkets to support safe meat hygiene inspection

UNISON, the UK’s largest union, today called on the country’s biggest supermarkets to back its campaign to guarantee that the meat they sell is safe to eat and their products labelled correctly.  

The union is contacting Britain’s biggest supermarkets urging them to oppose plans by the EU to drastically cut the meat inspection regime.  

Meat hygiene inspectors are employed in abattoirs up and down the country and inspect every carcass for signs of TB, dog and human parasites, foot and mouth and other diseases as well as faecal contamination. They are also responsible for ensuring that any contaminated meat does not get into the food chain via burgers or sausages.

A recent survey published by Mintel showed that less than half (49%) of consumers trusted the safety of their food and 37% disagreed that supermarkets were aware of the origin of their food. In addition independent research conducted for Labelling Matters shows that 83% of consumers in the UK want to know which farm system has been used to produce their meat and dairy products, and 79% said farm animal welfare was important when deciding which food products to buy.

Paul Bell, UNISON National Officer for Meat Hygiene Inspectors, said: “The reputation of some of the biggest supermarkets in the country has taken a real knocking because of the latest horse meat scandal.  It is in their own interests to reassure customers that they are doing all they can to make sure that the meat they sell is safe to eat..." 

Read more on the UNISON UK website.

DEREGULATION NOT AN OPTION FOR MEAT INDUSTRY

27 Feb 2013

A presentation at the Food Standards Agency to explore ways to ‘tackle the burden’ of EU legislation is wholly inappropriate in the wake of the meat crisis, UNISON said today.

The UK’s largest union said that stronger, tighter regulation was needed to restore consumer confidence in the meat industry and protect the health of the public.

Ben Priestley, UNISON national officer said:

“Given the ongoing horsemeat scandal, it is wholly inappropriate that discussions on how to ‘reduce the burden’ of EU legislation should be taking place at the FSA. Regulation is not a burden; it is there to protect the consumer, and to keep the public safe.

“This latest scandal to hit the meat industry is evidence enough that what we need is more, stronger legislation – including a daily inspection regime – in place to ensure that a scandal on this scale cannot be allowed to happen again.”

UNISON has hit out against the light-touch regulation that has persisted since the mid-2000s, and has called for: The reintroduction of daily official inspections of all licensed meat cutting plants and cold storage facilities to ensure public health and consumer confidence. The testing of horses killed in the UK for the drug BUTE, and for the dangerous parasite, ‘Trichinela Spiralis’. A permanent move away from ‘light-touch regulation’, including the inspection – official or independent – of food manufacturing premises.

ENDS NOTES TO EDITORS

The presentation ‘How to get what you want in EU negotiations’, from the Better Regulation Executive Europe Team, will tomorrow (28/02/13) address the FSA on ‘how departments can influence EU legislation’, and discuss how they can ‘support the FSA to minimise the burdens of EU legislation’.

See this release on the UNISON UK website

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