Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council

The Authority used a computerised database system for recording all food law enforcement activity and for compiling monitoring returns to the Agency. The system had only been operational for 15 months and during that time effort had been placed into validating the accuracy of data on the system and ensuring that staff received appropriate training in the use of the database. File checks carried out during the audit showed that in general, information held on the database was consistent with that held on paper files.

The Authority was selected for audit because of inaccuracies in the statistics provided for inspections of high risk food standards premises. This appeared to be attributable to errors made during the transitional period between database systems. Checks carried out during the audit confirmed that the Authority had now resolved the problems leading to the inaccuracies.

There were still however some anomalies identified relating to inconsistent or inaccurate use of codes and some misreporting relating to improvement notices served. There were also some discrepancies between the figures provided in database reports run during the audit and the corresponding statistical monitoring returns made to the Agency. Whilst a number of checks were being carried out by the Authority on the accuracy of the database and the validation of monitoring returns, these had not been fully effective in identifying and resolving the problems found on audit.

The Authority had not provided any information on feeding stuffs enforcement activity on the monitoring returns, however, the database system had now been configured so that future monitoring returns would record such activity.