Day 111 - 30 Mar 95 - Page 45
1 if Ms. Hovi is going to run over into tomorrow anyway, when
2 we rise (and I would like to rise not later than, say,
3 quarter past 4 today for a variety of reasons), if she can
4 actually identify which are the actual provisions to which
5 she has referred, or which she says any of the matters she
6 has spoken to are relevant, then that will help.
7
8 If you make photocopies of the first page of the
9 Regulations which normally says to what they relate, any
10 part of the Regulations which say what the commencement
11 date is, the particular Regulations or Schedules upon which
12 she relies, and any definition Regulation within the
13 Regulations. Carry on for the time being.
14
15 MR. MORRIS: I am not sure if we have got the definitions.
16
17 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Unless Mr. Rampton raises objection, you can
18 talk to Ms. Hovi at quarter past four so she can point out
19 what she has in mind too. Do not mark them. Stick a
20 Post-it on the relevant pages and then get them
21 photocopied. If you need some help, Mr. Riley may be able
22 to give you some help overnight.
23
24 MR. MORRIS: Do we want to have a five-minute break?
25
26 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes, very well.
27
28 (Short Adjournment)
29
30 MR. MORRIS: What is your view on the benefits or otherwise of
31 total viable count, TVC, testing?
32 A. Benefits or otherwise, where?
33
34 Q. I do not know -- from meat samples.
35
36 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Just ask: "Does it serve a useful purpose
37 and, if so, what and if not, why not"?
38 A. Well, it definitely serves a purpose. I think it is a
39 microbiological tool that must be used with the utmost
40 care. You have to know what you are doing and what you are
41 reading when you use it. In my mind, it only serves as a
42 purpose of monitoring a situation, a bacteriological
43 situation, and that is the way I have used it in my
44 professional capacity. All abattoirs I have worked for,
45 and most that I have visited, do regularly use total viable
46 counts as some sort of a monitoring tool.
47
48 It is very misleading to use it as a proof of the safety of
49 whatever you are applying it to, the meat or the surfaces,
50 or vice versa. It can only be used as a tool to monitor
51 the situation. Obviously, the microbial counts have
52 significance as well. I am not saying that if you get a
53 very high count on a total viable culture, that you can say
54 that this has no bearing to the cleanliness, hygienic
55 condition of this table. If you have a high count,
56 obviously you have a problem there and that is why it
57 cannot be used as a monitoring tool.
58
59 I think there are a few rules, generally accepted,
60 scientific rules, about TVCs and one of them is that it has
