By JASON PARIS
THE Chief Executive of Restaurant & Catering NSW, Robert Goldman, has called for drastic changes to the Food Authorities name and shame list, calling it inconsistent and unfair.
The Register of Penalty Notices is a collection all of the offences by NSW restaurants in regards to food safety and is accessible online.
“Since [the list] came out we have been calling for a three strikes rule,” Goldman said. “After three strikes, then you should be named and shamed. There should also be uniformity between councils, the same procedures, the same forms, the same fines…all Environmental Health Officers should be held to the same standard.”
The website received over 25,000 hits in its first three weeks of being active. It currently lists 761 offences since November 2007, including a local Chinese restaurant in Queanbeyan, which was charged a $330 fine for failure to maintain food premises and equipment in a clean condition on 4 September last year.
“It obviously undermines confidence but are all the charges relevant to food safety? There was an example of a restaurant being charged for having a Bells [ice freezer] with no thermometer,” Goldman said. “Restaurants are concerned about…the stigma attached to it. It is a sensitive issue.”
Restaurant manager John Melvin agrees that the system needs to be changed.
“We are very concerned about being labelled as a ‘dirty restaurant.’… Food safety should be a huge concern, however the lack of details about some of [the offences] are misleading. In this economy we cannot afford to have customers scared off, because that means that many will lose their jobs,” he said.
A representative of the NSW Food Authority could not be reached for comment.
