Food fraud 2016-2018

Please could you provide figures for the total number of local food fraud cases recorded by the council each year from 2016 until 2018 inclusive, (‘total reports’ includes all reports submitted by regional liaison groups, consumers, industry, police, government departments, enforcement bodies, and regional intelligence databases).  

Food fraud = the deliberate and intentional substitution, addition, tampering, or misrepresentation of food, food ingredients, or food packaging; or false or misleading statements made about a product for economic gain. 

Fraudulent intention is only likely to be identified during an investigation and ultimately determined by the courts. We therefore do not classify information received in this way. In relation to cases identified where Food advertising or labelling is an issue we recorded the following;

2016: 206

2017: 145

2018 to date: 143      

Please could you provide brief details of the cases of food fraud which were recorded, broken down by a) food business type, b) food type, c) nature of suspected or confirmed fraudulent activity

A) Food business type

 B) Food Type

 C) Nature of suspected or confirmed fraudulent activity

Please could you confirm the action taken by the council (including ‘no action’) 

All complaints are considered, and initial investigations undertaken.

In 2017 we had one prosecution involving misleading claims on food (Nutrition and Health Claims (England) Regulations 2007).  There were no prosecutions in other years therefore no action.