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

Originally posted by MystikMushroom
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.

I've personally ate a ton of food left out overnight, or left out in conditions that make it entirely dangerous to eat, but I would never serve or sell that food to my customers.

1 because it's illegal. 2 because it;s not safe.

Just because you ate raw chicken one or two times, does not mean you can eat raw chicken every morning without eventually suffering some major food poisoning.

This premise is not only unscientific, illogical, but irresponsible and foolish.

The major problem with food pathogens is you can't see them. And you can't tell when food is in fact dangerous or safe to eat. That is why there are handling protocols to follow before consumption.

That, and many people don't even realize when they have been poisoned from food. The side effects of food poisoning are very close to flu symptoms and other illnesses. Therefore, many people are oblivious to when they actually suffer food poisoning.

reply to post by melancholiflower


You can see both sides and here is the crux, if the bin was accessible to the public and not locked then technically what leg do the store have to stand on but if as with most Tesco stores the bin was locked with a padlock (they get forced open) and/or on the store area not meant for customers, then Tesco would see it as theft due to the fact they have had to write this food off and it was a potential lost sale, so a customer taking it would in theory double that loss as they are not going to buy the replacement, it is standard policy for the Tesco security to lock the bin and the yard Where most are located is off limits to the public.

But as a Christian I see it as anti Christian policy and what harm has this woman done, absolutely none and this is really scraping the barrel to criminalise the hungry in our own country, I hope god repays Cameron and his crony's like Osborne in kind sooner rather than later, If it was down to me I would let them have it but as except for the feint possibility of food poisoning what harm can it do, rather that than someone starve.
This does indeed show whatever police force it was has got it's priority's seriously screwed up.

sorry haven,t read every reply but jesus taking someone to court cause they stole food out a bin?now did everyone get that?a bin?where is the world coming to when someone who can,t afford to eat is getting prosecuted for taking food out a bin,the world has gone mad.

reply to post by butcherguy


In that case pass an a legal addendum or law that indemnifies the property owner against any litigant if the injury occurs during an act of trespassing Case closed. Let the dumpster diver beware, which they already are.

Originally posted by MystikMushroom
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.

I do this all the time. To be fair and accurate-- I always nuke it a little extra when I do this, and length of time left out, ambient room temp, and the specific toppings on the pizza will all affect how comfortable I am doing this. But I've eaten pizza that was at room temp 24+ hours more times than I can count. Now, I would never do something like this in a professional setting. Ever. For quite a lot of reasons, including food safety.

But that just goes to illustrate the drastic difference between what a regulation will allow, and what is actually safe. The food industry is over-regulated. It is done this way on purpose, and for a reason. And while all of my aforementioned instructors (and a number of other professionals I've met) all agree that in most cases it's way overkill, it's also a kind of good thing-- because it does keep cases of foodborne illness from restaurants way down.


We also need tight regulations in supermarkets to protect the consumer. I can almost guarantee you that if most stores thought they could get away with selling you old, on-the-border-of-dangerous food, they would. But then no one would come back to their store and they'd lose more money. So it's only in their own financial interest to follow food safety protocol as closely as possible.



I still stand by my opinion that the stuff discussed in OP are mostly greed-driven and wrong.

reply to post by boncho


My grandfather worked as a baker for many, many years. He told me once that just because you can't see mold on the bread, doesn't mean there isn't any mold. Sometimes the mold is white, and so is the bread so...

Not sure how much truth there is to that.

Anyway, my old roommate went through culinary school and had to take the classes you mentioned. He taught me quite a bit, and when I have soups or sauces going for a long time, I use the temp guidelines set forth by our Health Dept. My induction top allows me to set the temp within +/- 5F.

I've also had gastric bypass, so food goes through me like a drain.

Originally posted by boncho
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?)

You seem to be taking what I said out of context here, I wasn't referring to this food specifically. Could be any food really, and I use kids as an example since you brought it up. And yes, I would be less likely to give a child questionable food than what I would myself, likewise i'd give my dog food that I wouldn't eat. To me this is all common sense.

Personally I just don't think the extremities of health and safety is as necessary as it's made out to be. We've managed to evolve without it, a little knowledge goes a long way but we're so quick to forget our natural defences against bad food. The beautifully overlooked evolutionary art of disgust for example.

Ultimately it all revolves back around to money and the protecting of.

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.

This is fair enough, but this isn't some independent grocery store - this is tescos, from what I know tescos is the highest grossing supermarket in the country. As for the business metrics you've provided, why not sell the steaks for the £1.50 they cost and try break even? Especially since these big companies are paying a lot lot less for these products than smaller companies.

On top of this, from the bit of business that I do know, these megalith companies are in the habit of calling a loss whatever is the potential dip in profits, not an actual loss in finances. For example, wetherspoons don't allow their staff a 4p pint of draft pop and say that this would be a £1.50 loss as that's what they'd charge for it if it were sold. This is profit driven rather than actual figures. In my world a customer purchasing a £1.50 beverage, which is a £1.46 profit = some 36 and a half staff drinks paid for + happier staff who are probably less likely to shaft you back at any opportunity by sneaking some quality cabbages out to their mates...

It all comes back to protecting profits and investments - basically what this entire system is run on. It's like war of the worlds only we're the machines killing off the last bit of humanity.


Yet across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us.
— H. G. Wells (1898), The War of the Worlds

reply to post by Maxatoria



The biggest reason is employee theft scams. This is what they are trying to avoid. Lawsuits are in second.

reply to post by boncho


Though I may agree with you on some points, how do we know whether or not this "food safety handling course" was not created by the government itself? As for the FDA, not a trustworthy administration, if you ask me. Far as I understand, they are buddy-buddy with Monsanto and they are also the ones that say, "Well, the arsenic levels found in chicken are very low, so . . . yeah, it's okay to eat them." Just saying.

Originally posted by Kmhotaru
reply to post by boncho

 

Though I may agree with you on some points, how do we know whether or not this "food safety handling course" was not created by the government itself? As for the FDA, not a trustworthy administration, if you ask me. Far as I understand, they are buddy-buddy with Monsanto and they are also the ones that say, "Well, the arsenic levels found in chicken are very low, so . . . yeah, it's okay to eat them." Just saying.

These are the kinds of posts I find amusing. So if they find arsenic levels that have been studied and shown to be below the amount needed to negatively affect someone, they are a lying murderous organization... But if they try to warn people eating food that are not within the safety parameters, they are obviously lying?

Seems they can't win no matter what.

By the way, arsenic is found all over the place in nature....

reply to post by iwilliam


Here is where you make a slight error.

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.

"Reasonable" does not enter into our out of control tort system and our overly litigious society. Of course a plaintiff's lawyer is going to say, "The store should have secured the bin so my client could not eat the food in there and wouldn't have gotten horrible food poisoning." A jury of knuckleheads could very well find for the dumpster diving plaintiff.

Of course it is all about protecting the store's self interest. Every business wants to avoid costly lawsuits.

reply to post by MystikMushroom

Not sure how much truth there is to that.

Your grandfather was correct.
I have seen white mold on bread crust and I have seen it on rye and pumpernickel bread.
I've eaten moldy bread before, not 'totally encrusted' moldy, but moldy nonetheless. It was all the bread I had at the time. It really isn't noticeable if you toast the bread.

My sister works in a supermarket and at the end of the day any food left over that is still fresh is given to a homeless shelter i don't see why tesco wouldn't do that

I tend to notice that the bigger the company then the less giving they are with their food waste. When i've worked for independent places they've usually sent out of date food home with staff if they want it, but the bigger multi-establishment companies tend to be much stricter. There's a couple of people near where I live that bring food waste home and leave it out for the cats (there's loooads of cats here), and I think that's great cos at least it's getting used.

Also my mate used to work at Subways and they'd always let the staff take home whatever was left at the end of the night - though maybe there's a difference between fresh food leftovers and actual out of date products.

Perhaps a bit more transparency on their reasonings would ease the absurdity.

I know that Giant Supermarkets donates day old baked goods to local food banks. At least the poor don't have to dive in the dumpster for it there.
So they aren't all bad.

reply to post by boncho

Yeah right, until you enter the parallel universe where they do do that, and you will be ranting and raving how their food caused food poisoning and you want them to be shut down because a 5 year old kid died. And how that all the people who suffered from their tainted food they gave away should receive money for pain and suffering.

That's just being dramatic.

People do die of food poisoning from food bought off the shelves too you know, and the majority of people are perfectly able to discern when food is rotten for themselves...it's not like they take a packet of food that is green with mold, has putrid patches of rot all over but look at the use by date on the package and say to themselves, oh it's ok to eat because it's still within the use by date!

We might be headed towards a total handholding nanny society, but we're not quite at that stage yet i'm happy to say.

Besides, i remember not so long ago, top TV chefs created a luxury banquet of gourmet foods for hundreds of foodies..including top rated food and restaurant critics and writers...the twist was ALL of the food used was supermarket 'waste food'...and they all loved it.

Don't assume that people are automatically going to eat rotten food, that 'waste food' is actually bad food, or that poor people attempting to feed themselves and their communities by liberating food that is thrown away are going to automatically sue supermarkets because they get a guts ache from binned food.

Again...a simple sign near or on the bins would negate a potential law suit against supermarkets.

Cheap and easy.