30 replies to this topic

[GMO]

Can anyone help me with this question? In the UK, I had always thought that a food handler could be held liable by law for their own actions as well as a company's management and the firm? I'm asking because we were talking in a meeting about reporting illness and I said that if we have trained people, given them opportunity and explained why and people fail to report illness then it would be their responsibility under law surely? (Obviously we'd not want to get to that point though!)

[Tony-C]

Can anyone help me with this question? In the UK, I had always thought that a food handler could be held liable by law for their own actions as well as a company's management and the firm? I'm asking because we were talking in a meeting about reporting illness and I said that if we have trained people, given them opportunity and explained why and people fail to report illness then it would be their responsibility under law surely? (Obviously we'd not want to get to that point though!)

This is an interesting point you raise. This control is critical for high risk foods. If you have trained your staff and they have signed to say they understanding of the rules then you will have some sort of due diligence defence. Do you have some method of montoring compliance like hand swabbing?

From the FSA:

The law requires that in all food businesses other than those engaged in
primary production (e.g. farmers and growers) and associated operations:
• “No person suffering from, or being a carrier of a disease likely to be
transmitted through food or afflicted, for example, with infected wounds,
skin infections, sores or diarrhoea is to be permitted to handle food or enter
any food-handling area in any capacity if there is any likelihood of direct or
indirect contamination.“
• “Any person so affected and employed in a food business and who is likely
to come into contact with food is to report immediately the illness or
symptoms, and if possible their causes, to their manager or supervisor.”

Identifying infected food handlers usually relies on food handlers reporting illnesses, symptoms and conditions and so requires their understanding and cooperation to work effectively. I have worked with companies that did not pay sick pay for the first 3 days of absence which does not encourage employees to comply with this particular aspect of a food hygiene policy.

Regards,

Tony

[Jean]

In our company all food handlers are asked to sign stating that they will report any mentioned illness or when they are unwell. The management pays them full amount for the first 15 days and then half pay for 30 days. The full expenses incurred for their treatment in government hospitals are taken care by our company.

[Tony-C]

In our company all food handlers are asked to sign stating that they will report any mentioned illness or when they are unwell. The management pays them full amount for the first 15 days and then half pay for 30 days. The full expenses incurred for their treatment in government hospitals are taken care by our company.

That sounds very fair and considerate.

Regards,

Tony

[Jean]

Management commitment

[Tony-C]

Management commitment

Does the same policy apply to all of the management team?

Regards,

Tony

[Jean]

Yes, insurance provided for management team in private hospitals only.

[Kamwenji Njuma]

Dear All,

Basically most food processing companies ensure that their staff signs the illness reporting form but goverment officials would demand that the manager incharge is held liable for any outbreak.In my case,being in a medium company the management provides for medical assistance incase you get sick when coming.

Regards,
Jeremy

[Kamwenji Njuma]

Sorry,not when coming,it should be when working.

[Techy4580]

In our factories all staff are asked to sign a food handlers agreement along with their contract of work.

This clearly lays down the 'rules' that staff have to follow should they have an illness - and also includes periods of sickness when on rest days, during a holiday or if a close contact (ie living in the same house, partner etc) is suffering from an illness.

We have clear guidelines on return to work interviews which all staff have to complete following an illness AND when returning to work following a holiday.

We also have a clear flow shart which allows those conducting the interview to ask questions and decide on a course of action by using the flow chart. This we find is essential as often the member of staff conducting the interview has no medical knowledge.

We have posters in the rsrt rooms and canteens which again remind staff of what their legal obligations are under the food safety act - everyone is clear that if they are ill they have to report it.

[Tony-C]

In our factories all staff are asked to sign a food handlers agreement along with their contract of work.

This clearly lays down the 'rules' that staff have to follow should they have an illness - and also includes periods of sickness when on rest days, during a holiday or if a close contact (ie living in the same house, partner etc) is suffering from an illness.

We have clear guidelines on return to work interviews which all staff have to complete following an illness AND when returning to work following a holiday.

We also have a clear flow shart which allows those conducting the interview to ask questions and decide on a course of action by using the flow chart. This we find is essential as often the member of staff conducting the interview has no medical knowledge.

We have posters in the rsrt rooms and canteens which again remind staff of what their legal obligations are under the food safety act - everyone is clear that if they are ill they have to report it.

Sounds a comprehensive system. Are you manufacturing high risk products? Do you do pre-employment screening as well?

Regards,

Tony

[Techy4580]

Hi Tony

Yes - many of our product lines are ready to eat and so we are very careful in ensuring all our staff are aware of the potential issues of illness and contamination of food products.

We have a comprehensive pre-employment questionnaire which is sent to an Occupational Nurse for sign off. Any potential problems are then sent to a company doctor who will give final sign off or, if appropriate, a restriction in working areas (ie low care areas only).

Think we manage to cover all the bases but as usual we are reliant on staff actually following the rules!

[OZLEM ACIR]

In our company, management is liable for personnel health whatever occurs to them in factory borders.

Besides, when he/she goes to other cities in our country for job company takes resposibilities of workers totally.

Regards,

OZLEM ACIR

[GMO]

Does anyone know how the law would be specifically interpreted in the UK? I think as far as malicious contamination goes, the person responsible (ie the employee who contaminated it) is held accountable, however, I think it's only the business proprietor in the UK who would be held responsible if someone deliberately did not report illness and then went on to contaminate food. I'd question if that's fair.

Ok, for handwashing you can train people and then do random handswabs but handswabs won't necessarily be effective at picking up if someone has food poisoning.

I've had a thought that I think I'm going to put some reminder signs in toilets here but it's a gap isn't it? If you tell someone not to do something, have return to work procedures and encourage reporting as far as you can (without having a free for all policy on sick pay) what more can you do? I'm sure as a proprietor you'd be covered by due diligence but is (or should) the food handler be covered by that too? I'd say no.

[Simon]

Does anyone know how the law would be specifically interpreted in the UK? I think as far as malicious contamination goes, the person responsible (ie the employee who contaminated it) is held accountable, however, I think it's only the business proprietor in the UK who would be held responsible if someone deliberately did not report illness and then went on to contaminate food. I'd question if that's fair.

Ok, for handwashing you can train people and then do random handswabs but handswabs won't necessarily be effective at picking up if someone has food poisoning.

I've had a thought that I think I'm going to put some reminder signs in toilets here but it's a gap isn't it? If you tell someone not to do something, have return to work procedures and encourage reporting as far as you can (without having a free for all policy on sick pay) what more can you do? I'm sure as a proprietor you'd be covered by due diligence but is (or should) the food handler be covered by that too? I'd say no.

Hi GMO,

I think as with health & safety if the worst was to happen e.g. someone got seriously injured there would be an investigation by the relevant legal body. If the company had broken the law and the enforcing body believed there was enough evidence to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt - you would end up facing criminal charges in a court of law, which could result in fines and or imprisonment.

Whether the above proceeded or not the company would likely face a civil claim from the complainant(s) for damages. In this case the court would decide whether the company was negligent and to what extent and this would determine the level of compensation awarded.

Basically if the stuff hits the fan as a company you are liable. However, all of the systems and control measures the company has in place as well as their reaction and attitude to the problem and the corrective action taken will impact positively on both of the above. Due diligence; not totally bullet proof but good armour that protects the company form damage.

I’m quite sure it would work something along those lines.

Regards,
Simon

[GMO]

That's an interesting point Simon, sorry it took me a while to come back and read it! Under H&S law though it's not just the company who is liable, it's the individual if they have not followed what they've been trained to do and it's been audited / supported etc and an individual's actions lead to injury in themselves or others they are also liable under the law!

[Charles.C]

Dear GMO / Simon,

I recall reading an internal directive issued by a large UK processor's lawyer commenting on the questions the company were using in their pre-employment illness screening procedure. The lawyer was basically stating that legally a doctor would be obliged to inform the relevant applicant that a number of the questions were infringing their rights and he could not initiate them without the applicants written consent. Similarly he was not allowed to inform the intended employer of the associated results without same consent.

I suspect that an explicit (generic) answer to the original question is not easy as already discussed with respect to malice aforethought etc.

Rgds / Charles.C

[Esther]

Can anyone help me with this question? In the UK, I had always thought that a food handler could be held liable by law for their own actions as well as a company's management and the firm? I'm asking because we were talking in a meeting about reporting illness and I said that if we have trained people, given them opportunity and explained why and people fail to report illness then it would be their responsibility under law surely? (Obviously we'd not want to get to that point though!)

Dear GMO

As we all know, medical screening (and also screening in the form of questionnaires, IMO )are almost unuseful.


How often are you going to carry out medical checks on the employees? How often are they given the questionaire to be signed? Every year? Every three months? every month? every week? every day?

And also, we know that the a high porcentage of people are carrier of staphiloccous aureus and they even do not know it.

And what about carriers? If they do not say anything, how to fing it out? Again, medical checks? When? when start working? after two months of starting working? In a random basis?

Definitively, the most important thing and the only effective way is TRAINING and make people BECOME AWARE.

To be honest, I would prefer a person suffering from an illness working in a food premise who is very competent and very well trained rather than a healthy person showing bad hygienic practices and poor personal hygiene.

Best regars
Esther

[GMO]

I know it would be difficult to prove but we have the training etc. in place and I have been in a situation before where someone has lied on a return to work and has had diarrhoea on holiday which was only picked up because at that site stool tests were performed on return from illness and holiday. Personally I hate having to give out stool tests because I believe it discourages reporting but it was only when I took this guy (a team leader) through the fact he had tested positive for Salmonellae that he admitted he'd had symptoms. We were fortunate that it didn't appear he'd infected any food but he could have!

[Tony-C]

I know it would be difficult to prove but we have the training etc. in place and I have been in a situation before where someone has lied on a return to work and has had diarrhoea on holiday which was only picked up because at that site stool tests were performed on return from illness and holiday. Personally I hate having to give out stool tests because I believe it discourages reporting but it was only when I took this guy (a team leader) through the fact he had tested positive for Salmonellae that he admitted he'd had symptoms. We were fortunate that it didn't appear he'd infected any food but he could have!

You were fortunate that your systems were robust enough to pick this up. I assume that you would take disciplinary action in such circumstances?

Regards,

Tony

[GMO]

Actually this was a while ago and as soon as I wrote the above I realised that was exactly what I should have done but in all honesty I didn't. The guy had been to India and as soon as I told him, I realised that there is a problem with people going to certain countries that they *expect* a certain amount of travellers diarrhoea and don't think it's worth reporting. What I've done since is talk about this in training and explain it's important to report any incident but you're right, I should have taken action.

[Rizwan Ahmed]

You were fortunate that your systems were robust enough to pick this up. I assume that you would take disciplinary action in such circumstances?

Regards,

Tony

i agree with tony there should have been action in such situation. but sometime we ignore it and employees they take it for granted and keep on practicing unhygienic practices repeatedly knowing that nothing would happen to them. and this overall demoralizes the people who work efficiently and according to the set procedures.

[Esther]

Actually this was a while ago and as soon as I wrote the above I realised that was exactly what I should have done but in all honesty I didn't. The guy had been to India and as soon as I told him, I realised that there is a problem with people going to certain countries that they *expect* a certain amount of travellers diarrhoea and don't think it's worth reporting. What I've done since is talk about this in training and explain it's important to report any incident but you're right, I should have taken action.

Dear GMO

I think you have answered yourself. When to give the health questionnaire to employes? One of the answers is " when returning from vacancy.
But other important thing is TRAINING of the supervisor. Signing off a questionnare without a later supervison is unuseless. An make a supervision on somethig you do not know about, it is also unuseless.

Best regards
Esther

[GMO]

Dear GMO

I think you have answered yourself. When to give the health questionnaire to employes? One of the answers is " when returning from vacancy.
But other important thing is TRAINING of the supervisor. Signing off a questionnare without a later supervison is unuseless. An make a supervision on somethig you do not know about, it is also unuseless.

Best regards
Esther

Yes but that wasn't my question. Training and questionnaires on return from holiday are already in place. Admittedly I should have pushed for disciplinary action in the above case, however, with all of these in place, if the person lies which may not be picked up by routine screening (screening is not a requirement of UK law and also I believe it discourages reporting) then who is liable by law?

[Tony-C]

Yes but that wasn't my question. Training and questionnaires on return from holiday are already in place. Admittedly I should have pushed for disciplinary action in the above case, however, with all of these in place, if the person lies which may not be picked up by routine screening (screening is not a requirement of UK law and also I believe it discourages reporting) then who is liable by law?

If someone lies deliberately they are liable. The problem if you don't take disciplinary action is the next time it happens if it is a different person you could be considered unfair as you did not take action previously. I have been in a similar position and although it wasn't one of my priorities it was something that needed to be done, especially as it sends out a message to all staff. It is quite difficult but one of the fundamentals of management is to be fair and consistent.

Anyway more importantly, how long to go before the baby is due?

Regards,

Tony