Official Report: Minutes of Evidence
Committee for Health, meeting on Thursday, 10 June 2021
Members present for all or part of the proceedings:
Mr Colm Gildernew (Chairperson)
Mrs Pam Cameron (Deputy Chairperson)
Ms Paula Bradshaw
Mr Jonathan Buckley
Mr Gerry Carroll
Mr Alan Chambers
Miss Órlaithí Flynn
Ms Cara Hunter
Ms Carál Ní Chuilín
Witnesses:
Ms Elvira Diez-Garcia, Food Standards Agency NI
Ms Maria Jennings, Food Standards Agency NI
Food and Feed Hygiene and Safety (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2021: Food Standards Agency
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): I welcome, by video link, Ms Maria Jennings, who is director of the Food Standards Agency (FSA) here. Can you hear us, Maria?
Ms Maria Jennings (Food Standards Agency NI): I can indeed, Chair. Can you hear me?
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): Yes, we hear you, Maria. Thank you, and you are welcome. I will come back to you in a second. We are also joined by Ms Elvira Diez-Garcia, who is head of operational policy and delivery. Can you hear us, Elvira?
Ms Elvira Diez-Garcia (Food Standards Agency NI): I can indeed. Can you hear me?
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): Yes, we hear you, Elvira. Thank you. I will go back to you, Maria. Would you like to lead off on the briefing? Then we will come to members' questions.
Ms Jennings: Thank you very much, Chair. Good morning, members, from a rather overcast Newcastle. As the Chair said, we are here to brief you on the Food and Feed Hygiene and Safety Amendment (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2021. I want to give you a brief overview of the statutory rule (SR), and then we will be happy to take questions.
The SR is technical in nature. It includes amendments to update references and correct some minor drafting errors in four existing Northern Ireland SRs. The SR is subject to the draft affirmative procedure because one of the provisions relates to the collection of fees and charges. That particular provision updates legislative references on fees and charges that arise from unplanned official controls following the detection of non-compliance with food and feed official controls. It is the continuation of a provision that we already have in law, and it relates to non-compliance with food and feed safety requirements.
I will just remind members that non-compliance can vary considerably. It can be very minor. For example, it can be just one localised food hygiene risk in an individual business, which can be resolved effectively in the normal way that we resolve those things. However, non-compliance can also relate to a major food safety incident that might involve many establishments across a number of jurisdictions and that can be resolved only through several authorities working together, maybe in a number of countries, so it can go from the very small to the very large.
The SR allows us to recover the costs of those follow-up actions where business operators are responsible for non-compliance. Otherwise, those costs would be paid through the public purse. It is important to say that there is a high level of compliance on food safety from Northern Ireland businesses. It is rare that we would want to use the provision, but it will continue to be an important provision, providing essential enforcement support for councils, DAERA and the FSA, should that be required on rare occasions.
The main objective of the SR is to amend the Official Feed and Food Controls Regulations (?Northern Ireland) 2009 (OCR) and regulations that have been made under the OCR since November 2019. As you know, the OCR sets out a framework of controls that competent authorities have to carry out, like inspections and sampling at food businesses, in order to verify compliance with agri-food legislation. That has applied in Northern Ireland since December 2019. Most of the provisions of the OCR and the regulations that were made under it clarify and simplify existing requirements and have introduced a more risk-based approach to controls that we are very much aligned to. Therefore, existing enforcement arrangements in Northern Ireland are already aligned to those requirements.
The SR ensures that competent authorities in Northern Ireland continue to have the powers that they need to undertake official controls and verify compliance with food and feed safety law. As I said, it also amends a couple of minor drafting errors in other regulations.
I want say a word on stakeholder engagement. We had a full consultation on the OCR, which ran from August until October 2019. We had eight responses to that consultation, and they were broadly aligned to and supportive of the proposals. A consultation on the SR took place from April until 23 May 2021. We received only two responses to that consultation, and both were supportive of the proposal.
In summary, the proposed SR is technical and is required to update our existing SRs. It is subject to draft affirmative procedures. If the Committee is content with the proposal, a motion will be submitted to the Business Office in order to secure a date for Assembly consideration. Thank you very much, Chair. I am very happy to address questions.
"parallels equivalent ... requirements in England, Scotland and Wales".
Given that we will "continue to follow EU rules", the position in the South of Ireland will remain the same. Does that mean that there is no divergence at present and that everyone is in the same position?
Ms Jennings: Absolutely correct. That is the position. We are all in the same place. There is no divergence.
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): OK. On the earlier consultation in 2019, where you had eight or nine responses that were broadly supportive, what issues were flagged by the responses that were not broadly supportive, and have those been addressed?
Ms Jennings: The difficulty that was highlighted was that we were a little behind England, Wales and Scotland. That was a reminder for us to move swiftly to do the work that we need to do now.
Ms Bradshaw: I have two quick questions, and the first is about the consultation. I appreciate that the SR is technical, but I am conscious that you could better engage with businesses as opposed to just the councils. Do you have any plans to increase that engagement?
Ms Jennings: Our consultations go out to a wide range of consultees. While that one was of specific interest to councils, we also consulted with food businesses, agri-food representatives and organisations across the board.
Ms Bradshaw: OK. How will you communicate any potential changes with businesses that will be affected on the far side of the change?
Ms Jennings: We have well-matured relationships with all our food businesses. If the communication is something for, for example, the meat industry, we tend to target that industry. If it is something much more general, we talk to the wider business sector. We use nibusinessinfo.co.uk, which is the Invest NI site, to get information out to businesses. We also work very closely with the colleges. The College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise (CAFRE), for example, does a lot of work with us and runs seminars to get information out to businesses.
Ms Bradshaw: OK. Thank you. You may not have the answer to this question this morning. The last time the Health Minister came to the Health Committee, it was just after the Queen's Speech, which included the introduction of calorie information on menus, and he said we would need to pick that up with the Food Standards Agency. I am not sure whether you will have an answer for me today. Obviously, a lot of people from eating disorder charities are concerned about that and what could come from it. If you do not have an answer today about where you are with that, could you supply the Committee with some information on it?
Ms Jennings: We would love to come back to the Committee to talk about the full range of our obesity prevention work and what our plans are for providing information to consumers.
We already have a voluntary scheme in Northern Ireland called Calorie Wise, and that has been very successful. We would love to come back. That would be great. Thanks, Paula.
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): Are there any other questions from members? I do not see any other indications. Thank you for coming along to brief the Committee. We will complete our consideration of the SR, but, for now, Maria and Elvira, thank you for attending. We will go ahead and formally consider the SL1. Thank you.
Ms Jennings: Thank you very much, Chair.
Ms Diez-Garcia: Thank you.
Mr Chambers: I have a quick question. Is the SR connected to the implementation of the protocol?
The Committee Clerk: We will try to get them back on. It might take a couple of minutes to contact them again and ask them to come on.
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): I do not want to move on to the next substantive item if we can get them back on briefly. Alan, would you be content if we sought a written answer?
Mr Chambers: My position on it will be guided by whether it is part of the protocol. If it is part of the protocol, I would be opposed to it. If it is not, I would be happy to support it. I would like clarification on that before I indicate my support for it. Thank you.
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): OK. We will see whether we can get that clarification. I think it is best that we stay on the line. Is that correct, Clerk, or would it be better to suspend for a short time?
The Committee Clerk: I am happy for one of the team to make contact to see whether we can get the officials back on. We should know in the next minute or two. The key point is that this is an SL1 proposal, so, if we are unable to get them back on today, there is a bit of time to seek clarification on it before a decision has to be made.
The Chairperson (Mr Gildernew): If it transpires that we cannot get them on reasonably soon but we can get them back later in the meeting, we can pick it up again then. We will wait a short time to see whether we can get a quick answer.
The Committee Clerk: Sorry, Chair. I think that we will just move on. We have tried to make contact, but it is going to voicemail.