Supermarket letters and political updates.

Due to the success of the petition to date and your terrific support, we now intend to write to the ten largest supermarkets in the U.K. We wish to know what their position is, on protecting public health, by keeping meat hygiene inspections independent. It will be interesting to see their responses, due to the recent hygiene scares in the media. As and when we receive their responses, we will let you know on the petition what they have to say. The plan is to send at least one letter a week to each of the supermarkets and update the petition accordingly. The first supermarket that has received this letter is Sainsbury’s, who are the second largest supermarket in the UK. The letter is below this update. Also Unison the Trade Union have written separately to Sainsbury’s on 18-12-2017 in relation to keeping meat hygiene independent and consumer protection. If you use Twitter or Facebook, we would very much appreciate you sharing this post. Alternatively, if you wish to bring this letter to the attention of your local store manager, this would be greatly appreciated. I recently met with my local MP John McDonnell, who is also Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer. Whatever your political beliefs, having known him for over 20 years, he really is a very good constituency MP, who we consider lucky to have helping ordinary people such as ourselves. We discussed the petition with him, and how we can move forward with it, including possible meetings and parliamentary questions (both of which he has previously help us with). He has also offered to put a link to the petition on his website. Photography of John and myself attached. Finally, Happy Christmas! Sainsbury's letter: 21-12-2017 Mr M. Coupe Chief Operating Officer Sainsbury’s PLC 33 Holborn London EC1N 2HT mike.coupe@sainsburys.co.uk Don’t Risk lives-Keep Meat Hygiene Inspections Independent. https://www.change.org/p/don-t-risk-lives-keep-meat-inspections-independent Dear Sir, We are sure that your company is aware of the meat hygiene scandals that have recently been in the media, namely the chicken plant in West Bromwich, (covered by the Guardian and ITV News) that appears to supply your company and the “Blowing the whistle on the Meat Industry” by the Bureau of Investigative Jounalism & ITV. The Food Standards Agency (FSA) are planning to reduce the frequency of meat hygiene inspections, reduce the number of directly employed Meat Hygiene Inspectors (MHIs) in slaughterhouses and to continue the practice of them not being present in cutting plants, through a freeze on recruiting new MHIs. This will mean more official controls will be in the private sector, which does not appear to be what your customers support, as a UNISON meat inspection survey by COMRES indicated in December 2016. When the public were asked in this survey whether “Slaughterhouses should be required to have their food safety and quality standards independently assessed by external Government inspectors”, 87% agreed. Also in this survey, in relation to fewer inspections, 74% of adults across all political persuasions in England and Wales, said they would be concerned about changes that would see fewer independent inspections by FSA vets and inspectors, and more inspections by private contractors & slaughterhouse themselves. We believe the survey suggests that the public do not trust the industry that produces the meat to be independent, but they do trust Government employed MHIs. Given the above, does Sainsbury’s believe the FSA are taking the best course of action to protect the public from food bourne illness, is by reducing independent meat hygiene inspection services, or do you believe the FSA’s course of action is wrong? We would be happy to have your company’s view on this. We also wish wish to know if Sainsbury’s believe that they have a moral obligation to ensure their suppliers meet all hygiene regulations, and if so how you take pracitcal steps to achieve this? The public, as well as our small national charity, have some serious concerns which are demonstated by the petition above. This petition has reached over 101,000 votes of support to date. We look forward to your response. Yours faithfully, Steve Nash