M&S, Aldi and Lidl refuse chicken from hygiene shame firm
MARKS & Spencer, Aldi and Lidl have temporarily stopped accepting supplies of chicken from a plant accused of serious safety failures.
Workers were filmed changing date labels, which meant customers could be eating meat after a safe ‘use by’ date.
Potentially contaminated chicken was put on the production line after it had fallen on the floor and older chicken pieces were mixed with fresh ones.
It also emerged that packs of Tesco’s ‘ Willow Farm’ fresh chicken were bulked up with chicken originally destined for Lidl. The supermarket has removed the claim ‘reared exclusively for Tesco’ on a description of the meat on its website.
The factory, in West Bromwich, is part of the 2 Sisters group, the country’s largest supplier of chicken to supermarkets.
The revelations emerged in undercover filming during an investigation by ITV News and the Guardian. The factory prepares fresh chicken for Sainsbury’s and Lidl as well as Tesco, Aldi and M&S. Yesterday, M&S said: ‘We have commenced an immediate investigation and will not be taking any more products from this site until it has concluded to our satisfaction.’
Lidl said: ‘We immediately launched an investigation with the supplier and will not be sourcing from those sites until the investigations have been satisfactorily concluded.’
Aldi said: ‘We have suspended supply from this site while we carry out an urgent investigation.’ As of last night, Tesco and Sainsbury’s had not stopped accepting chicken from the plant – but both said they were investigating the allegations. The Food Standards Agency said its inspectors ‘found no evidence of breaches’ at the West Midlands plant earlier this week. But the watchdog has asked the team responsible for the allegations to provide further details.
FSA chairman Heather Hancock said: ‘It is the responsibility of a food business to ensure the food it sells is safe and what it says it is … any products on the market which we believe to be a cause of concern will be urgently removed from sale.’
Chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall told ITV News that for factory farmed chicken ‘ margins are so tight and the numbers are so huge that the pressure is on farmers and producers to cut costs and cut corners … to deliver that ridiculously cheap price being demanded’.
The 2 Sisters Food Group was founded in 1993 by Ranjit Singh Boparan. The Sunday Times estimates he and wife Baljinder are worth £544 million.
A spokesman for the firm said: ‘Hygiene and food safety will always be the number one priority … we remain committed to continually improving our processes and procedures.’