Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what information his Department holds on the (a) source of sub-standard pork in the food chain; (b) type and (c) level of resulting contamination.

All pork meat sold in the United Kingdom should originate from either approved slaughterhouses or from imported meat that has entered the UK through approved channels.

The Food Standards Agency is present in all pig abattoirs in England and Wales, where every pig slaughtered is subject to ante and post-mortem inspection and responds to food safety incidents and foodborne outbreaks, working with local authorities and industry to remove from the market products that are not in compliance with safety legislation.

In the most recent full reporting year, 2021/22, 46 incidents and outbreaks involving pork and pork products were reported to the Agency and removed from the market, most of these due to contamination with Salmonella.

The Food Standards Agency works with Port Health Authorities and the Animal and Plant Health Agency to apply controls at border control posts. The levels of non-compliance identified in relation to imported pork products remain low. Between 1 January 2022 and the present, six consignments of pork from non-EU countries have been rejected.

In addition to these controls on Rest of World imports, recent surveillance at the UK border and at retail premises on EU imports has identified some pork meat products that did not meet the UK import requirements and these incidents have been resolved through recall and removal from the market.