Woman in court for taking 'waste' food from Tesco bins

While i am tempted to get all sarcastic with the "every little helps" tag that Tesco use in their ads, i have to sadly concede that they need to protect their botty from an increasingly litigious and self responsibility denying populace. I hate the waste, but get where they are coming from.

On a more positive note, i do know of big supermarkets that donate "unfit" food to Animal Charities, Educational/Therapeutic Farms and so forth - all because some bright spark approached them and made a good case.

A smile and a good bit of reasoned discussion can go a long way

Originally posted by Maxatoria
The unwanted stuff gets sent to use feeding pigs/composted etc

I think sending food to pigs was outlawed over here after the foot and mouth business.


reply to post by boncho
You are presuming that I in a parallel universe has different moral standards as well?

I'm all for personal responsibility, if some kid dies after his mum feeds him dodgy food then it's his mums responsibility no the supplier. I understand people are trapped around a whole bunch of legal issues, but I don't see them doing much to change it and think they seem quite happy worrying about finances, bollocks to the hungry.

As for profit margins, I think you misunderstand, i'm aware that ten grands worth of food is a loss but the further loss comes from the locals who now have some free food thus won't be spending as much in their stores. Furthermore, if they weren't so profit-over-waste-food driven then why are their reduced prices so high? 40p off a £3.00 steak or it goes in the bin? Surely flog it for a quid and get rid. Recently clearance food items have taken a steep incline, I used to be able to get packs of mince for 10p, now they're not even three quarters of the price.

We do alot of things for 'public safety' but this just seems to enhance peoples stupidity and continue the cycle that they need looking after. Responsibility is a huge empowerment device, take away responsibility - take away empowerment.


Additionally I just find it idiotic that our councils and government bodies enjoy pushing the recycle business onto people but the same doesn't apply for food. On top of this we're now being coerced into accepting GM foods with open arms as this would solve food shortage issues... so instead of reducing waste we continue the waste and sell more food presumably resulting in even more waste...

There was a similar case a couple of years ago of a woman being arrested for taking a chair out of a skip that would've otherwise gone to landfill. Oh the legality! The legality! Where's the humanity?... oh, we can't afford humanity round here.

Originally posted by skalla
On a more positive note, i do know of big supermarkets that donate "unfit" food to Animal Charities, Educational/Therapeutic Farms and so forth - all because some bright spark approached them and made a good case.

A smile and a good bit of reasoned discussion can go a long way

Thanks for the positive note, any more information on this?

Did find this www.theguardian.com... which is great. Thanks again for lifting me out of my ranting somewhat

This is what I called a wobblier. First off, its wrong to wasting food period when there are hundreds and thousands of people starving each and everyday. The dumpster is on private property so yes entering the property to go dumpster diving and taking things out of it can be considered as theft from property or business. Strange but true fact.

It is also a health hazard and safety risk to be removing food from a dumpster regardless its fresh or not. If dumpster diver was to become sick or poison and the business owners allow it, then somebody is getting charged, fine and sued. So its the principal of the whole idea.

Remember also, personal information ends up in these dumpsters and some people takes advantage of that. Buy back to the point, diseases can be spread if people were to be stocking up dumpsters value meals.

I say if it's in the trash it's fair game. Who did she hurt? No one. The State was not harmed. Other people weren't harmed.

Tesco is just being greedy.

reply to post by melancholiflower


Well, i know a guy that runs a farm for retired horses and has an extensive menagerie that he tours around schools etc and he also does therapeutic work with folk with learning disabilities, autism etc who did just this - i used to take autistic kids there to do falconry on a weekly basis. He gets old food from at least 2 local supermarkets from the usual big names all just for asking and explaining.

ETA: the Guardian article is promising and hopefully some change will come - it's quite a surprise really that in all the supermarkets clamouring for good press, that they dont try to tackle waste and self aggrandise on this basis - how hard would it be after all for them to have a compostoing scheme at the very least, and then send their yummy soil to community projects etc.

I guess we should take some responsibility for this for not applying some pressure or making the suggestion. I think i have just talked myself into sending a few emails on the subject.....

Only problem I see is that if something goes wrong, there are abusers who will present the product to file a lawsuit should they fall sick. However I think Tesco should drop the charges knowing very well that times are bad in general for many people.

There are many free lancers teaming up to provide food for the homeless in San Francisco.

SF_Dumpster_Diving

I also remember seeing a segment on 'Bizarre Foods'

Bizarre_Foods_Segment

It's be interesting to know for sure whether all of the potential risks from eating old food are more costly than throwing it away. I wonder if the only reason it's more costly is because people sue for inappropriate amounts? I mean, maybe there's blame on both sides for this.

I know people cooking food at home routinely don't follow safe food handling. And yet society has survived up until thsi point despite all of the improper food handling going on. I know this doesn't excuse improper food handling. It's like saying that people survived well enough back when open racism was common, so why don't we allow it? For one thing, life expectancy back then was shorter than it's now. If we pulled back on all our standards, we'd lose some quality of life.

This is why the first world can't interact effectively with the developing world. The standards gap makes it so that separation is enforced to discourage conflict from erupting. Can you imagine all of the improper food handling going on in developing countries or in poorer nations?

Older people typically scoff at all our standards nowadays. They say things like "Back in my day, if something fell on the floor, we ate it because that's all we had. Nothing went to waste."

Here's some comedy:
abcnews.go.com - Restaurant Lemons Tested Positive for Fecal Matter and E-Coli...

..........
"Good Morning America" tested lemon wedges from six popular family restaurants and what they found was more frightening than refreshing. At four restaurants, "GMA" found the lemons were contaminated with fecal matter, including one sample that contaminated with E. coli.

To put the lemons to the "GMA" test, we visited three sets of chain restaurants: Applebee's, TGI Fridays, and Chili's. All six of the causal dining restaurants were in New Jersey.

After swabbing each lemon we were served, the samples were sent to a microbiology lab at New York University's Medical Center.

We found yeast and harmless bacteria that are commonly found on fruits and in our environment. But four of the samples were contaminated with dangerous bacteria.

"A small risk, but a risk nevertheless by ingesting byproducts of these lemons," Philip Tierno, director of the clinical microbiology at NYU.

The fecal matter was found at both of the Applebee's and TGI Friday's restaurants. The E. coli was found at the Applebee's in Clifton, N.J. At Chili's, we found no evidence of fecal matter or E. coli at either restaurant.

But that's not all. At half of the restaurants we caught workers grabbing lemons with their bare hands. New Jersey's health code insists that workers wear gloves or use tongs.

"I see that people have no concern of where they put their fingers," said Tierno. "They'll take things with their bare hands rather than gloving up and distributing the food stuff as they should."
..........

the food poisoning argument is BS

especially when it is precisely to avoid lawsuits for food poisoning
that the recommended "sell by" date is set a month or 2 before it begins to spoil

and here we have the doublestandard rearing it's ugly hydra-heads once again

if it had been the state or it's agents doing the dumpster diving
to put you in jail or impoverish you with fines, they'd argue that by throwing it away, you lost any reasonable expectations of ownership/privacy.

just another case of the police/leo's and courts showing who it is they "protect and serve"

but feel free to ignore me as I Am quite "Insane".

reply to post by melancholiflower


Back in the day I used to work for WalMart, now those guys are evil, lol. They have cameras everywhere in their stores even in the loading bays. They used to throw out more food stuffs then you could shake a stick at and no one was allowed to touch it. Although one guy ate a Cadbury Cream Egg that was going to be thrown out, well they got him on a micro camera that looked like a iron bolt in the ceiling. Long story short, he got fired for eating a .50 cent cadbury cream egg that was going to be tossed out anyway.

So wasteful!

I must admit though I am part of the problem. I work in a fancy restaurant and at the end of the night every day we throw out pounds of rice, soup, whatever else the Chef deems won't be in top quality for the next days service. I could feed a starving person one full meal everyday if I was aloud to take the food.

Silly Woman, she obviously doesn't know only refugees are allowed procure food from refuse bins here in the U.K!

Now if we could only get them to put back what they don't want the U.K streets would have a whole lot less used nappies, sanitary towels and empty take away containers lying around! LoL

On a more serious note what the hell is going on with this nation???

The lady in question was obviously hungry!

The theft by finding law should in no way whatsoever apply to Food!!!

reply to post by rickymouse


I don't know what they do to our milk here, but my GF swears it lasts longer than any other place she's ever lived. Usually, the expiration date is about 12 days out. I've found though, that you can go 2-4 days past that date if you keep it in the fridge.

There are also some foods that never seem to go bad. Ketchup for example never seems to go bad, the same with mustard.

I saw a dumpster at my local grocery store full of hot dog and hamburger buns. They were still "good" but I didn't have any room, and the legality of it didn't feel right. Most big stores have cameras trained on their dumpsters, and I didn't want to get in trouble for a few bags of buns.

Originally posted by bonchoI think a good number of people in this thread could use a food safety handling course to learn proper food safety.

Response Part 1

How about a servsafe course and certification as part of a culinary school curriculum? Good enough? Okay, then let's begin my analysis.


Before I get specific, I will point out that food safety regulation go above and beyond what is necessary to keep people safe. In other words, if it is probably safe to eat something that's been out for three hours, and it's only "maybe" unsafe to eat that same thing left out ten hours, they will tell you "six hours." (That is an example exaggerated for clarity. Most sensitive foods like meats should not be left out for ten hours.) The same thing goes for storage and cooking temperatures.


Time temperature controls used by supermarkets are usually even more strict than those used by restaurants-- for the simple reason that they don't know how it will be handled or prepared once it gets home (whereas they do know this at a restaurant). So standards are even more unnecessarily strict.


This, by the way, is not entirely my own opinion born of my knowledge. All of my instructors (including the servsafe guy) acknowledged this and mentioned it explicitly.


Now let's get more specific. And not to ruin the surprise-- but overall you were overly-critical of the situation in trying to paint a picture that would favor the company and justify their actions, more than the defendant in this case.

Originally posted by boncho

Originally posted by rickymouse
100 packs of ham could be frozen and it would last a year. I am sure the woman was planning to give some to her friends also, I would if I got that much.

That's great, except that spores and parasites will also be frozen for a year and will come back to life as well.

Only half true and fully disingenuous. Only some parasites can survive long term freezing. To be fair you are mostly worried about fish and pork in that regard. However, appropriate cooking temp/time will kill any of that.

Originally posted by boncho

Originally posted by rickymouse
If you have vaccuum packed ham in your hot car for six hours, it will shorten the shelf life, and may take on a little taste, but it will be ok if eaten quickly.

The general rule is 2 hours between temperature changes as the safest maximum time. Vacuum packing does not do anything as the bacteria can already be inside the meat. Hence why you are told to cook things to certain temperatures in the first place.

General rule? Whose?[*** Unless Servsafe has changed from the last time I was certified, it is four hours outside of a temperature controlled environment-- double the value you claim, before it is considered "unsafe." If you're talking about an item that was originally frozen, you can tack quite a bit of time on to that, as it has to come closer to room temp (at least outside the range of a refrigerator) before that clock starts running. And do remember my first point here-- even this four hours outside of fridge temps is "on the safe side."

Here's the part where I will point out that some restaurants break these rules all the time. Not all, of course. Some are sticklers for the rules. Some only bend them. But some go way beyond. Profit margins for restaurants are some of the thinnest in any industry, and food cost / food waste is a huge deal. So many, especially smaller places with less business, cut corners where they can.

Further, saying that vacuum packing "doesn't do anything" is a bit disingenuous. Vacuum packed foods stay safe longer, including when minorly "time/temperature abused." What you say about bacteria being on the food inside the vacuum packaging? Technically true. However, if that meat came from a good supplier with a clean facility, this is minimized. Even moreso (like WAY more) if the food is flash-frozen, or if it is already cooked. If already cooked, it should be already free of food contaminants and safe to eat when vacuum sealed.

Furthermore, what you describe above-- where a contaminant bacteria produces byproducts that will get you sick even if you kill off the bactera-- is a very specific type of foodborne illness, and a quality that is only possessed by some contaminants. In many cases, if you kill off the pathogen (which can usually be accomplished by cooking the food properly) you can prevent foodborne illness.


So in reality, it's not necessarily as unsafe as you make it sound. Furthermore, I think any and all responsibility for that should be on the person who acquired the food outside of the supermarket's normal, approved chain of custody (aka normal purchase).

Response Part 2

You are absolutely correct that food safety regulations are the exact reason they can't donate expired food to food banks, and the reason they can't just allow people to take stuff. However, items sitting in a dumpster marked with "no trespassing" or something similar could not be construed as "allowing" someone to take an unsafe food, by any reasonable estimation. However, putting up a "no trespassing" sign should not also mean that they are forced to prosecute anyone who violates it. IMHO there should be a grey area in cases like these.

And it is still very much a scumbag move on their part that has far more to do with self-interest than public safety.



***IMPORTANT EDIT To be fair to boncho, after a little googling it turns out that two hours is the limit for food in the "danger zone" (between 39-140 degrees fahrenheit) for the Food Safety and Inspection Service.

However, the FSIS works with the USDA regarding commercial supply of food products. I repeat that Servsafe, which handles certification for food safety in the restaurant industry says four hours, as opposed to two. Perhaps it's changed since the last time I was certified-- they do change those safety parameters occasionally. Though it would also make sense for them to be more strict for the factories that produce meat and other products for a very simple reason. Every link in the chain of custody of food introduces another point where things can go wrong. At no point in the chain are you aware of whether or not something has "gone wrong" (aka time temperature abuse) higher up in the chain.

For example, say the meat going through the processing plant typically spends 1 hour outside of temperature. Let's say at some point in the process of being stored, transported, delivered, etc, it spent another hour outside of temp. Working at a restaurant, I have no way of knowing this. It might have been outside temp 10 minutes, and it might have been two hours. This is one of the many reasons for these strict rules regarding time-- you have no idea how closely these rules were followed by anyone else in the chain. And if others are being lax, or may have been, you have no room to be.

In fact, maybe the "four hours" window given by servsafe is based on the notion that the food products might be spending two hours outside of temp at the facility where it originated-- and maybe if the FSIS limit was one hour, instead of two, servsafe would be saying "five hours" instead of four. I hope that was clear..... And I'll admit that last part was pure speculation.

But hopefully the additional info about the flow of control over the food product as it goes from point A to B to C made my point more clear about the time limits.



And I still say that prosecuting is an unnecessary and scumbag move on the part of the company, that has more to do with self interest than any concern over safety. I bet they just figure that the more ham this woman possesses (and maybe even gives away) the less she and others will have to buy later. Gotta love the disgusting greed of corporate types.

reply to post by MystikMushroom


On the ketchup and mustard lasting - it's the vinegar.

reply to post by melancholiflower

You are presuming that I in a parallel universe has different moral standards as well?

I'm all for personal responsibility, if some kid dies after his mum feeds him dodgy food then it's his mums responsibility no the supplier.

So you agree that no parent, should feed this food to their kids, in which case, you are saying it's morally irresponsible to feed this to a child, therefore, not suitable for human consumption. (If a kid can't eat it why should anyone else?)

If you think it's not okay to feed kids but it's okay for adults, that's kind of like saying, kids have to wear seatbelts but not their parents.

Furthermore, if they weren't so profit-over-waste-food driven then why are their reduced prices so high? 40p off a £3.00 steak or it goes in the bin? Surely flog it for a quid and get rid. Recently clearance food items have taken a steep incline, I used to be able to get packs of mince for 10p, now they're not even three quarters of the price.

They have some metric that works for them. i.e., 100 steaks going in the bin (steaks are £1.50 COST = £150 TOTAL). Sell at £2.60 or 50p, and which one works:

Sell - option A 45 Steaks @ £2.60 and
Sell - option B 100 @ 50p Steaks.

(Total sales numbers reflect the pricing and demand for said pricing)

Option A gross: £117
Option A profit: £-33

Option B gross: £50
Option B profit: £-100

I made a scenario here that should be easy to follow. Sell the steaks at 40p off, and sell half the number because reduced price is not reduced enough to urge people to buy the lot. Or, sell them at 50p, £2.50 off the original retail price and sell all of them.

In both cases you have a net loss, but one os obviously less than the other.

You see, even in my scenario only selling half as many with a higher reduced price, the shop is only losing 3 times less, than if they slash the cost a few times lower.

Remember the idea for a grocery is to sell all the food, not just "some". So, a loss is a loss. And if they take a loss on something, you better believe they will raise prices somewhere else to make up for that loss. If they don't they will be unable to stay in business.

I'm sure they'd love it if they could manage.

If they sell at losses they go out of business. Negative cash flows don't last very long. So... the only thing I see in your post is a complete failure to address real business metrics. Instead you make it seem like they can simply give steaks away for free because they were going to toss them all in the bin anyhow.

But, put simply, it just isn't like that.

We do alot of things for 'public safety' but this just seems to enhance peoples stupidity and continue the cycle that they need looking after. Responsibility is a huge empowerment device, take away responsibility - take away empowerment.

I actually agree with you on this point. Wether or not it is a useful argument in this case, not sure.

reply to post by iwilliam

And I still say that prosecuting is an unnecessary and scumbag move on the part of the company, that has more to do with self interest than any concern over safety. I bet they just figure that the more ham this woman possesses (and maybe even gives away) the less she and others will have to buy later. Gotta love the disgusting greed of corporate types.

So it's better they let everyone take from the bin? Let's forget food safety and simply consider the business aspect of this. Yes, I admit there is the point of, "Why give food away for free when people should be paying for it."

Most of you see this as a decision from a greedy executive in their ivory office tower.

But lets consider this option a little closer. I put bins outside my grocery which people snatch expired food from. Is it one or two people that show up daily? Does an unscrupulous competitor find out about it, snatch up all the food and later put it on his own shelves because food safety doesn't mean anything to him.

Or wait, hold on.

What about the employees who start dumping good, expensive foods into the bin, even though there was nothing wrong with them.

In fact.. their buddies are waiting back there with a pick up truck to load up all the foods they personally selected to be declared, unfit for sale.

There are so many reasons as to why this is not a good idea for both the consumer and the business and frankly I'm stunned by how many people here can't see it.

reply to post by iwilliam


I've left a pizza out for 24 hours before. I just cut off the edges of a slice that got crusty, nuked it and was just fine. I did have the box closed if that makes any difference.

reply to post by MystikMushroom


Back when I was a student I used to love 3 day old Doner pizza.

There was nothing better after a heavy weekend! Those were the days!