Day 081 - 31 Jan 95 - Page 11
1 microbiological (inaudible) showing recommended -- I think
2 that is what they are, at any rate -- counts for cooked
3 substances?
4 A. Yes.
5
6 Q. My Lord, that is the document I handed in this morning. Do
7 you see the first part of the table at the top of that page
8 which is numbered 99 has four categories whereas McKey has
9 three: "Satisfactory", "fairly satisfactory",
10 "unsatisfactory" and "unacceptable", "potentially
11 hazardous". Can you look, for example, at the second item,
12 "cooked meats", we see that a colony of less than 10,000,
13 ten to the four, is it?
14 A. In the first column, yes, ten to the four is 10,000.
15
16 Q. Is "satisfactory"?
17 A. Yes.
18
19 Q. 10,000 to 100,000 is "fairly satisfactory"?
20 A. 10,000 to a million.
21
22 Q. Sorry, you are quite right, it is a six, is it not?
23 A. Yes.
24
25 MR. MORRIS: Are we looking at "cooked meats", are we?
26
27 MR. RAMPTON: Yes. 10,000 to a million is "fairly
28 satisfactory", more than a million is "unsatisfactory" but
29 no figure is given for "unacceptable". Can you explain why
30 no figure -- these are, I think, are counts per gramme, are
31 they not?
32 A. Yes. There is no figure in the "unacceptable" because
33 these are guidelines and because they are dealing with
34 total micro organisms they may not necessarily be pathogens
35 present in here, so you cannot say that is unfit for food
36 just because of a high TCC or TVC.
37
38 Q. You notice that there is, I forget whether it is called a
39 "dagger" or what it is called, to a footnote, do you see,
40 in the last column?
41 A. Yes.
42
43 Q. If you look underneath the two tables, the second footnote
44 says, which is the one concerned, I think: "Prosecution
45 based solely on high aerobic plate counts in the absence of
46 other criteria of unacceptability is unlikely to be
47 successful". Why is that?
48 A. Because it does not necessarily indicate that it is
49 unfit for human consumption.
50
51 Q. If you look at the second table -----
52
53 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Can we just pause there a moment? You may
54 have said (and I may have missed) at the top,
55 "Microbiological Quality", what is CFU?
56 A. Colony forming units, sir.
57
58 MR. RAMPTON: Is that the same as, similar to, or different from
59 a TVC?
60 A. These are just alternative descriptions of the same
