The Food Standards Agency has sent a communication to all authorities after obtaining approval from the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Health, Jo Churchill, to permit deviations from the direction given to local authorities in the Food Law Code of Practice (England) and the Feed Law Code of Practice (England) – the Codes.

Deferral of planned interventions

Until 17 April 2020, all planned feed, food hygiene and food standards interventions should be deferred. This will ensure that footfall in feed/food business establishments is kept to a minimum and will enable local authorities to divert potentially diminished resources to urgent reactive work – see below - and to other wider public health actions required locally during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our direction on this is in line with Section 5.3.6 of the Food Law Code of Practice (England) and Section 5.3.9 of the Feed Law Code of Practice (England). We will notify you if the position changes before 17 April and, at any rate, will update you on what the position will be post 17 April.

Local authorities should also defer any requested FHRS re-inspections.
When it is feasible to resume planned inspections, it will be important to apply a risk based approach to outstanding inspections prioritising the highest risk establishments.