Dorset Council Food Service Plan 2025-2026

Dorset Council came into existence in April 2019. Prior to this time, five separate district councils’ Environmental Health teams were responsible for food safety regulation and oversaw the port health function, whilst County Council Trading Standards regulated Food and Animal Feed Standards. 
Whilst there was valuable local collaborative working between pre-unitary councils, there were of course separate corporate priorities, demands and styles. Following interim service review in 2019/20 the former district council food safety teams were combined to form the Food, Safety and Port Health Team, which was part of Community and Public Protection Team. This brings together:

• Trading Standards
• Licensing and Community Safety
• Environmental Protection
• Registration Services
• Bereavement Services

The Community and Public Protection Team was part of the Place Directorate but from the 1 April 2025 became part of the newly formed Public Health and Prevention Directorate and was renamed Regulatory Services.

In relation to food safety functions, convergence of the original district council services was concluded in 2020/21, with resolution of team structures along with a review and standardisation of processes and procedures.  

By contrast, the Trading Standards function, being derived from the former Dorset County Council, was already unified and so has not necessitated significant interim service merging work.

In 2021/2022 the Food Standards Agency (FSA) recognised the impact of suspending the Food Law Code of Practice on the routine food inspection programme. This suspension, whilst essential to support the Covid response and food businesses, had caused a huge backlog of premises awaiting a routine inspection. In order to address this in a risk-based way the FSA published the Recovery plan.

The Recovery Plan set out advice and guidance to Local Authorities on the delivery of official controls and related activities from the 1 of July 2021 up until 2023/24. From 2023/24 we are working to the Food Law Code of Practice. 

1.1 Aims and Objectives

The Food, Safety and Port Health service aims to protect the public health of our communities through provision of a service that is effective, risk based, proportionate and consistent. This involves working with businesses and the public so that their activities do not have a detrimental effect on the health and wellbeing of others.

The service promotes health, safety, and welfare of all whom live, work or visit the area with interventions focussing on provision of safe food through the food hygiene inspection programme, investigation of food complaints, responding to food alerts, a sampling programme and providing help and advice to food businesses and the public.  The service will be involved in and promote regional and national food hygiene strategies.

Closely linked to food safety the service investigates cases and outbreaks of food and water borne infectious diseases.

The Food, Safety and Port Health team is responsible for the enforcement of Health and Safety and acts as the Port Health authority; therefore, its food responsibilities cannot be considered in isolation. The whole service is subject to annual service business planning process and monthly performance monitoring. 

1.2 Links to Corporate Objectives and Plans

The service feeds into the corporate vision of Dorset Council ‘Working together to create a fairer, more prosperous and more sustainable Dorset for current and future generations. It will do this by way of delivery of a service that aims to support businesses to grow the economy, improve public health, ensuring strong and healthy communities which are part of the Councils Plan priorities.

Links to the corporate plan are established in the Food, Safety and Port Health Service Plan which is updated annually and forms part of the corporate planning process at the council. 

2.1 Profile of Local Authority

The Census 2021 survey reveals that the council area’s population increased by 4% from around 365,200 in 2011 to 379,600 in 2021 – equivalent to adding an additional town like Bridport. This is lower than the overall increase for England (6.6%), where the population grew by nearly 3.5 million to 56,489,800.

It also shows an increase of 24.8% in people aged 65 years (and over) and 33% of those aged 90 and over, while there has been a decrease of 2.8% in people aged 15 to 64 years and a 3.2% decrease in children under 15 years.

The total area is approximately 250,000 hectares consisting of 95 miles of coast which is a designated UNESCO World Heritage site, the only one in England. Over half the area is designated as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and 7% is designated Sites of Scientific Special Interest.  

The area is predominantly rural and semi-rural with the larger towns being Dorchester, Weymouth, and Wimborne. About 22,000 businesses are registered in the county, 86% being micro firms in the areas of manufacturing, health, retail, education, and hospitality. Tourism and agriculture are also significant industries.

2.2 Organisational Structure

The food safety service is part of the Food, Safety and Port Health team which in turn is part of the Public Health and Prevention directorate. The service is managed by the Food, Safety and Port Health Service Manager. 

Service structures were formalised in February 2021, and all staff are now on Dorset Council terms and conditions.

There are two teams managed by Team Leaders (reporting to the Service Manager) comprising Environmental Health Officers and Senior Technical Officers. The teams cover West and East areas, and each Team Leader has a lead role for interventions in that geographical area. 

In 2021, respective predecessor councils’ out of hours services for environmental health emergencies were merged to provide cover for the full Dorset Council area. The Place Management Board decided in 2023/2024 to trial removing the service for a year with associated review to evaluate the impact. 

Following the trial the service was removed and replaced with the Head of Service/Service Managers/Team Leaders working on a ‘best endeavours’ basis to respond to any partner agency requiring our service. Such situations will typically be emergency situations requiring a multi-agency response.

2.3 Scope of Food Service

The scope of the work covers food safety, occupational health and safety, port health, public health, and communicable disease functions of environmental health. Both Team Leader’s fulfil the Lead Food Officer role for the service as required by the Food Standards Agency. There is a separate trading standards team within Public Health and Prevention who undertake official food standards controls with regards to trading standards.

Five port health officers are authorised to provide a port health service, during 2022/23 one of the Senior TSO attended The Association of Port Health Authorities: An Introduction to Ship Sanitation Certificates and the International Health Regulations 2005 training course and attended the practical ship inspection course.

The Team Leader (West Team) is the lead Port Health Officer and manages an internal training programme to ensure that there is sufficient resilience for the provision of Port Health services. 

The council uses the services of accredited external laboratories for food safety analysis work:

Microbiological examination is carried out by The UK Health Security Agency, Food, Water and Environmental Microbiology Laboratory, Porton, Hants.

The council has a Service Level Agreement with UKHSA FWE labs, which is agreed annually. 

Chemical and other analytical work is carried out by Hampshire Scientific Services, Consulting Scientists & Public Analysts, Southsea, Hants and would be arranged when required.

Official controls carried on by this authority are currently being monitored by the Food Standards Agency (FSA) against the Food Law Code of Practice. In addition, the FSA have the power to audit official controls being carried out by the service at any time.
During 24/25 the FSPH team were audited by the FSA. The audit was a focused audit to assess the delivery of official controls in relation to the traceability of shellfish (live bivalve molluscs and gastropods) harvested in England. The audit took place on 16 and 17 July 2025. The auditors requested several documents before the audit and during the audit. Interviews were held with key members of staff, and a ‘reality check’ visit was conducted. 

The audit report was received on the 28 January 2025 and was largely positive. There were 2 recommendations. 

One was regarded service planning and as a result additional details have been included in the service plan under the ‘Demand on the Food Service’ section. 

The second recommendation regraded officer authorisation, training and competency. Work on this has started and will be taking place over 2025/2026 with the Team Leaders completing a competency matrix for each of their team based on the FSA’s Competency Framework. A gap analysis will then be undertaken and used to create a team training plan. We will produce a policy which clearly links officer competency to their authorisation.

During 2024/2025 the Trading Standards Team and Licensing Team transferred all their electronic data and systems into the IDOX cloud-based system, which environmental health functions have been using for over 7 years. This caused significant disruption to the work of the FSPH team due to a downtime period of over 6 weeks whilst the information was transferred into the IDOX system.

During this period, the team implemented temporary measures to manage service requests, accidents, infectious disease notifications, accident reports, sampling, routine inspections, new food business registrations and report on the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme. #

2.4 Demand on the Food Service

There are 5381 registered food businesses within the Dorset Council area as of the 31 March 2025. The majority are restaurants, caterers, hotels, guest houses and B&Bs, many being seasonal because of the demands of the tourist industry. We also have several specialist producers carrying out complex processes. Food premises are subject to inspection and are risk rated using categories from A to E. 

A breakdown of these is shown below. 

Profile of food businesses

Profile of food businesses
Premises rated A	1
Premises rated B	51
Premises rated C	383
Premises rated D	2178
Premises rated E	2662
Premises rated F	110

Complex food production

Approved Premises - 66 made up of:
Cold Stores	5
Processing Plants - Dairy	19 premises including: Large dairies / small dairies both carrying out pasteurisation in line and batch including selling via vending machines Small and large soft and hard unpasteurised and pasteurised cheese producers Premises who cut and rewrap dairy products. Premises making yoghurt including sheep and goats milk yoghurt Premises making Ice cream Premises carrying out milk pasteurisation and sales via churn/vending machines.  Also premises Kefir, Butter and Cream Soft cheese production with pasteurised milk. Small scale. Mozzarella, scamorza, ricotta, giuncatta
Processing plant – shellfish and fish	12 premises including Premises carrying out shellfish purification Premises shucking scallops Premises carrying out fish processing Shellfish dispatch centres Smoking and curing fish Canning of fish
Repacking/rewrapping - dairy	3 premises
Meat preparation/processing plants	12 premises including: Premises producing Charcuterie  Premises producing Jerky Premises smoking meat Premises producing dehydrated meat products Premises producing gammon, bacon, sausages and burgers Premises producing cook / chill meals for service to schools
Egg Packing stations	14 premises
Mollusc processing	1 premises

 

The above table illustrates a substantial number of complex processes and specialist producers for which the FSPH team have regulatory responsibility. Maintaining expertise for all these processes across all officers is very challenging. Our approach therefore needs to ensure that we have the necessary expertise within service. For example, advice for officers about shellfish is provided by a specific lead officer. One of the team leaders has a food processing background providing expertise, advice and support to other officers particularly in the areas of smoking fish and meats and canning.

We take advantage of training on complex food processes including charcuterie production, drying and smoking. On occasion businesses are willing to enable other officers in addition to the inspecting officer to observe the processes providing valuable training for those who require it.

Based on the total number of food registered premises in Dorset on 31 March 2025, which was 5,381 against the total food FTE, which was 11, this equates to a total of 490 premises per 1 FTE. This is considered to be high especially when there are the 66 complex premises many of which are rated B and thus require an annual inspection.

Only 6.26 of the 11 food FTE are competent and experienced to carry out inspections of approved and complex premises. With regards to shellfish this is reduce to 3 FTE. 

In addition to planned interventions officers must also inspect new businesses. In 24/25 a total of 611 new registrations were received. The trend locally and nationally has been towards increasing numbers of newly registered businesses each year.

We received 217 food complaints last year some of which required extensive investigation. 

Over 20 procedures require regular review by the Team Leaders. This includes management of a detailed Shellfish Registration Procedure and linked process, and a Local Action Plan (LAP), which explains actions required in the case of any shellfish incidents.

To enable effective regulation of the local shellfish industry and complex, specialist producers' we are required to ensure officers' competency is maintained through specialist training. This inevitably places considerable pressure on the training budget. We ensure that officer training is as focused and efficient as possible.

There are currently two classified shellfish bed; one has only very recently been classified (in April 2025). The team undertakes the official sampling of the classified beds and is a member of the Southern Shellfish Liaison Group to provide consistency in the approach to regulating shellfish production in the south of England. This work informs the National Shellfish Group, of which we are also a member.

Port Health work is undertaken by the authority. Royal Fleet Auxiliary (RFA) ships are often in the port, along with a cable laying ship and bunkering vessels; animal feed and cement are products commonly delivered to the port. The number of cruise ships visiting the port annually continues to increase with 60 vessels having visited or due to visit in 2025. Portland Port is not a Designated Port of Entry and currently no food is exported; however orange juice is imported but is not classed as High-Risk food, nor a product of animal origin.

Dorset Port Health Authority is designated as an approved port for issuing Ship Sanitation Exemption Control Certificates (SSCEC) and Ships Sanitation Control Certificates (SSCC) under the International Health Regulations 2005.

In 2024-2025 the Port Health activity was:

Port Health Activity	Number
Ship Sanitation Inspections	18
Ship Water Samples	39
Maritime Declarations of Health	0

 

There have been no significant issues where English may not be the first language at food businesses, but a translator service is offered if officers have concerns. 

The seasonal aspect of many businesses means there is more demand on the team from April to October. There are also several medium and large-scale events and festivals which take place most of which have a food element. The main events which are now established and place a demand on the service are:

• Camp Bestival – pre-event SAG attendance, pre-event site safety inspection, inspection of traders as appropriate.
• Dorset County Show – over two days, liaison with organisers, inspection of traders as appropriate
• Purbeck Valley Folk Festival - pre-event SAG attendance, pre-event site safety inspection, inspection of traders as appropriate
• Weymouth Seafood Festival - liaison with organisers, inspection of traders as appropriate
• Large number of small to medium festivals and food events – SAG, pre-event letter and guidance, inspections of traders as necessary

Priorities for 25/26

• Complete the food inspection program – which this year consists of 1283 premises.
• Continue to triage new premises so that the higher risk ones receive timely inspections.
• Continue to administer the Food Hygiene Rating System
• Continue the Alternative Enforcement Strategy (AES) for E premises to address the backlog.
• Introduce an advice service as part of a plan to increase income and support new businesses.
• Trial the use of the IDOX application for carrying out food inspections. 
• Respond as a team to the FSA consultation on proposed changes to the Food Law Code of Practice. 
• Review any affected procedures when the revised FSA Food Law Code of Practice is published.

Team working

Dorset Council is embracing hybrid working, and the Food, Safety and Port Health team collaborated in June 2021 to put in place a team Charter to consider how this would work. Officers can utilise homeworking, alongside inspections, visits, and the office to support the team members with balancing work and homelife, whilst providing a service to our customers during core hours. 

The team can be contacted during normal opening hours through the main council telephone number 01305 251010

Significant matters for 2025/2026

Programmed Inspection plan

As mentioned above the FSA expect us to now work to the Food Law Code of Practice. Below is the programmed inspection plan for 2024/25

Risk Categories	Number
A	1
B	48
C	190
D	1011
Overdue	33
Total	1283

 

We will monitor the programme closely and complete the FSA 2 temperature checks across the year.

2.5 Regulation Policy

There is an overarching Enforcement Policy for Dorset Council and one for Regulatory Services. Enforcement action takes into consideration this policy, relevant Food Law Code of Practice and the Better Regulation Delivery Office Regulator’s code 2014. The service adopts a graduated approach to enforcement which is clear, consistent, open, proportional, fair and based on the principles of risk.

3.1 Interventions at food establishments

Dorset Council aims to complete all food inspections in line with the Food Standards Agency (FSA) Food Law Code of Practice.  

We will also ensure that each new premises that registers with the authority are risk assessed and inspected based on that risk assessment and subject to an initial inspection and risk rated to determine inspection frequency and relevant future interventions. We have a procedure regarding this.

Food businesses that fall within the scope of the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS) are scored under that system at the end of the inspection. The authority has signed up to the FHRS Brand Standard. There is a Dorset Council policy and procedure for meeting the requirements of the Brand Standard and applying the scheme.

Alternative Enforcement Strategy (AES)

Category E premises are subject to an alternative enforcement strategy addressed separately to this plan. In 22/23 the AES scheme was used to determine if Cat E premises from former East Dorset are still operational or there were any changes to the business before uploading them into IDOX cloud. Where significant changes have been made these premises will be subjected to an intervention. 

This year we will continue to operate the AES scheme for Category E’s with due dates up to the end of March 2022. This area of work may need to be reviewed taking into account of pressures on business support from the Our Future Council work taking place this year along with any proposed changes to the Food Law Code of Practice.

Revisits and Rescores

Revisits will be determined by the inspecting officer but will always be carried out where the FHRS score is 2 or less and where there are significant issues of non- compliance with food safety legislation. The number of these visits varies each year.
 
If a business has been awarded a FHRS score of 4 or less (the top rating being 5) then a re-score visit may be requested. There is a charge for this visit of £250
and it will take the form of a full inspection. The FHRS score may go up, stay the same or go down depending on levels of compliance found.

3.2 Food Complaints

Food complaints and food hygiene complaints are received by the service and investigated in line with the food complaints procedure. Complaints and service requests usually come via the website portal or customer services team, and all are logged on Tascomi (IDOX Cloud). A food officer will respond within 3 working days. 

Number of complaints received in 2023/24

Food complaints	Hygiene complaints	Total
92	125	217

 

These are very similar to last year 24/25 when we dealt with 234 complaints.

3.3 Home Authority Principal and Primary Authority Scheme

Dorset Council’s Food Safety and Port Health team were asked to join the Hobbycraft Primary Authority which was previously in place with Dorset Trading Standards. This was agreed and we now have a Partnership with Hobbycraft to provide H&S and food advice to the management.

We make an annual charge of £1750 for 25 hours of Food, Safety and Port Health input plus any additional hours charged at £70 per hour.

This has been a good chance to review how a primary authority works. Staff attended the OPSS training on Primary Authorities recently and we intend to look at the opportunity against staff resource for future Primary Authorities.

This year we are going to be progressing another Primary Authority for H&S with Parkdean. 

3.4 Advice to business

The service recognises the importance of advice and guidance to businesses in order to support them in meeting their legal obligations with regard to food law. Officers will provide accurate and clear advice to any food business operating in the Dorset Council area. 

In 25/26 we will be trialling an advice offer (with terms and conditions) to all newly registered business at a one-off cost of £250 for 3.5hrs officer time to include a visit and report. This advice could cover the following areas, where Food Businesses may want more support: 
 
•    Advice on setting up a new business (food hygiene and safety advice)  
•    Advice on the requirements to have a food safety management system 
•    Advice on kitchen structure as required by applicable food hygiene regulations 
•    Advice on food safety practices as required by applicable food hygiene regulations 
•    Advice on the National Food Hygiene Rating Scheme  
•    Advice on food safety training  
 

The ‘offer’ will be reviewed at 6 months and again at the end of 25/26.

Officers will generally provide free advice by telephone but if the process is high risk a visit may be made at no cost. 

Businesses may also subscribe for free via the Dorset Council website to the online Food Safety Information Email Newsletter.

3.5 Food Sampling

Dorset Council participates in an annual national sampling programme which is co-ordinated by UKHSA. Additional local partnership sampling programmes may be undertaken in liaison with Dorset Food Group. This forms part of the Dorset Council annual sampling plan.

The annual sampling plan includes routine annual sampling from approved premises and sampling of milk for direct sale from registered premises. Imported food sampling is also considered however currently there are no importers of third country foods therefore sampling is taken as consequence of intelligence received or during routine inspections.

Sampling may also take place as a result of a complaint (food poisoning or hygiene complaint), concerns raised by an officer during an inspection or to assess standards at a new premise.

The service participates in shellfish classification and algal toxin sampling programmes co-ordinated by the Centre for Environment Fisheries and Aquaculture Science (CEFAS), the FSA contractor. There are cost implications for shellfish sampling to classify and maintain shellfish beds.

As a Port Health Authority, we also take ships water samples, for which we charge as this is a discretionary service, but one that complements our Port Heath role. We also take part in the UKHSA’s nationwide mosquito surveillance project in collaboration with a range of organisations across the country.

We have a number of mosquito traps at the port. Mosquito traps are set for 2 weeks every month, from mid-April to mid-October, and samples are identified by PHE’s medical entomology. To date we have not found any mosquitos. 

All food officers are competent to take food samples in accordance with the services’ sampling procedure. Samples are submitted for testing by UKHSA, Food, Water and Environment Laboratory, Porton, Hants. UKHSA provides the council with an allocation of number of samples that may be taken annually at no charge to the authority. 

3.6 Control and Investigation of Outbreaks and Food Related Infectious Disease

The service receives notifications of infectious disease (NOIDs) directly from The UK Health Security Agency (Southwest) in line with the procedures as set in the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Dorset local authorities and UKHSA and with the underlying single case plan.

There was a total of 690 notified cases of infectious disease in 24/25, 515 of these being Campylobacter. All cases of Campylobacter are not routinely investigated but sent a standard letter and guidance leaflet by business support.  All other cases are investigated by officers in line with the Single Case Management Plan. 

Any outbreaks of food poisoning or food borne disease will be investigated as a matter of priority. An overarching outbreak control plan has been drafted by UKHSA (SW) but this has not been ratified.

Port health includes issuing of Ship Sanitation Control Exemption Certificates and consideration of the International Health Regulations, monitoring ships movements into ports and monitoring the classified shellfish beds. Port Health are responsible for the control of infectious diseases from crew on ships coming into Portland Port. This is undertaken in liaison with the UKHSA. 

3.7 Food Safety Incidents

Food alerts are received by the service manager and team leaders through FSA Link and by email. Any received are assessed and action taken in accordance with the FSA Food Law Code of Practice and FSPH Service food alert and incident procedure. 

The number of Food Alerts for Action has reduced significantly over the past few years and therefore demand on the service is low.

3.8 Liaising with other organisations

The main liaison activities for food safety work are with other food authorities in the Southwest. The team are represented at the regional Dorset Food Liaison group where membership includes UKHSA, FWE Lab, Food Standards Agency (FSA) and representatives from Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council.
There are a number of established groups which operate at a Dorset, Southwest and National level to improve consistency of approach and resilience. 

These groups include:
•    Dorset Food Liaison Group 
•    National Food Hygiene Rating Scheme User Group 
•    National Food Hygiene Focus Group (DC represent the SW LA’S)
•    Dorset Public Health Network Meeting
•    Southern Shellfish Liaison Group
•    National Shellfish Group 
•    Dorset Police Rural Crime (PCG)
•    Dorset Health and Safety Liaison Group

Most meetings are held quarterly and are attended by the most appropriate member of the team. Officer resource is available as appropriate to support the work plans of collaborative groups bringing benefits of shared working to the service.

3.9 Food Safety promotional work, and other non-official controls Interventions

The food officers through their work will provide advice and support to businesses and the public as appropriate. The service will take part in FSA initiatives when resources allow and will make better use of social media such as Facebook and X to engage with food businesses and residents to disseminate food safety information and advice.

In 2025/2026 we will be taking every opportunity to raise the team profile within the Council.

4.1 Financial Allocation

The budget for the food service is reviewed each year through the budget planning and review cycle.

4.2 Staffing Allocation

A new structure was implemented in 2021 following service convergence and transformation, the new structure is shown below. 

Post	FTE	Approximate FTE food safety work
Food Safety and Port Health Team Leader	2	1.4
Environmental Health Officer x 8	6.4	5.06
Senior Technical Officers x 6	5	3.56

Business support is provided by a pool of officers managed by a Team Leader.

4.3 Staff Development Plan

Under the FSA Food Law Code of Practice all staff are required to demonstrate their competency to carry out official controls. The FSA updated and provided a revised competency framework. 

All officers are required to undertake a minimum of 20 hours food CPD annually. This is achieved through local training events, online food safety training, webinars, and other training if appropriate. Training needs are identified through monthly 1 to 1’s, competency review and the Dorset Councils Roadmap. A record is kept of all CPD which is checked periodically and assessed through the councils Roadmap which is a performance management tool which moved away from the annual appraisal in favour of more frequent but focused 1-2-1’s.

Following the FSA audit in 24/25 a spreadsheet was created of competency requirements based on the FSA Competency Framework to assess officers training needs. This has been used as a training gap analysis to inform officer training plans.

We will also be producing a procedure which details how we link officer competency to officers’ individual authorisations. 
 

Operational records are stored in the Team’s Tascomi information management systems (IDOX Cloud). Service delivery is supported by an appropriate set of procedures and standard documents. These are subject to annual and reactive review.

Internal measures are in place to ensure the quality of the service and that officers are competent to carry out official controls. The team carry out the National Food Hygiene Rating Consistency exercise each year to ensure there is consistency across the team. 

Regular FSPH meetings and individual team meetings are held which allow for case discussion, officer consistency of approach and learning opportunities.

The service has key performance indicator targets which are currently; percentage of businesses achieving a FHRS rating of 3,4 or 5, percentage of the FSA food inspection programme achieved and satisfaction with service derived from Business Satisfaction surveys which are sent to all premises following an inspection.

6.1 Review against the service plan

The service plan will be reviewed annually. The review will clearly identify any variance from the plan and the reason for this. Areas for improvement that have been identified will be included in the review.

6.2 Identification of any Variation from the Service Plan

We always try to work to the service plan. In 24/25 we didn’t complete all the Cat E’s we intended to do over the year; therefore, we now need to consider how we deal with a larger backlog of Cat E premises this year.

6.3  Areas of Improvement

•    Completion of the action plan following the FSA audit in 24/25
•    Officer competency checks to take place for all officers
•    Promotion of the team internally