CIEH Safe Food Conference

Anthony Baldock CEnvH FCIEH, Director of Health and Wellbeing, Ashford Borough Council. Anthony joined Ashford Borough Council in 2021 to set up the new Port Health service based at Sevington. He has been an Environmental Health Practitioner since 1987. Anthony worked in Local Government prior to the formation of the Food Standards Agency (FSA) and has extensive experience in the meat industry including fresh meat inspection at processing plants. He also worked for Hastings Borough Council where he was responsible for the fish market and overseeing the largest shore-based fishing fleet in the UK. He was the strategic lead at Crawley Borough Council where he was responsible for operations at London Gatwick Airport (LGW). He worked on the implementation of controls concerning imported food not of animal origin in 2009, along with products of animal origin and infectious disease controls related to Swine flu, Ebola and Covid-19. Whilst at Gatwick, he was responsible for two audits for the EU Food and Veterinary Office. He attended numerous EU Training missions concerning imported food and also acted as Chair of the Airports Committee for the Association of Port Health Authorities.

Dr Belinda Stuart-Moonlight, Chartered Environmental Health Practitioner. Belinda specialises in food safety and infectious intestinal disease control. Early in her career, Belinda worked as an Environmental Health Officer in local government enforcement, before taking up a Junior Research Fellowship at King’s College London. For the last twenty years, Belinda has run her own business providing consultancy, training, auditing and expert witness services. As an expert witness, the majority of her instructions focus on food contamination risk, and increasingly, injury and death from food allergy. Belinda is regularly sought after to provide opinion for both prosecution and defence, as well as for Coroners inquests.

Carol Archibald, Chartered Environmental Health Practitioner and Food and Safety Manager at Colchester City Council. Carol trained at Middlesex and was part of the first group of students to qualify through the part time route. She is now a fellow of CIEH, the chair of the Essex Food Liaison Group, and co chair of the Food Hygiene Focus Group. Carol is known for her work on Scores on the Doors that lead to the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS). She is also co-creator of the Essex TuckIN making food better project which seeks to encourage small businesses to pledge to reduce salt, fat sugar and calories. More recently Carol now co chairs CIEH coffee and catch up.

Darryl Thomson, Chair of UKHospitality Food Experts Group, UKHospitality. Having graduated with a degree in Catering Sciences, Darryl joined Bass plc and spent a long and varied career starting as a General Manager of a Public House, and then as an Area Manager followed by time in Marketing and Risk & Compliance, before being appointed as the Head of Safety for Mitchells and Butlers. Responsibilities included all aspects of Food Safety, Fire, Health & Safety, Trading Standards, Food Technical, including Allergens, and Safety and Quality within the Supply Chain. In 2009, Darryl was a member of the Food Standards Agency’s Working Group on Scoring/Banding and Safeguards for the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme. He subsequently gave evidence to the House of Lords Opposed Bill Committee on behalf of the BBPA when they petitioned the House of Lords against clause 10 of the London Local Authorities Bill 2008 (Mandatory Display for Scores on the Doors). Darryl is Chairman of the UK Hospitality Food Experts Group and was instrumental in the publication of the Catering Industry Guide 2016 and 2022. In October 2019, Darryl was appointed chairman of the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme Steering Group which advises the Food Standards Agency on the development of the National Food Hygiene Rating Scheme. Since August 2021 he has been the Food Safety advisor to UK Hospitality. He also advises several major pub companies.

Jim Cathcart, Policy Director, UKHospitality. Jim joined UKHospitality as Policy Director in April 2018. His role is to identify and influence public policy impacting the sector across a wide range of areas. This includes current work around digital platforms, copyright and competition, tourism, food safety, nutrition and health policy. Jim has many years’ experience in representing business interests to the UK Government, Welsh and Scottish Governments, local authorities and the European Parliament.

Katie Pettifer is the Interim Chief Executive of the Food Standards Agency, a non-ministerial department which makes sure that food is safe and is what it says it is and helps to make food healthier and more sustainable.  Katie joined the FSA in July 2021 and stepped up as the interim Chief Executive in August 2024.  Before that, as director for strategy and regulatory compliance, she was a member of the FSA’s executive management team and was responsible for the FSA’s overall strategy, legal, communications, governance and project delivery teams.  She also led the FSA’s regulatory compliance work, working with local authorities to ensure that food businesses are complying with the law on food safety and standards, and developing new approaches for the future through the FSA’s 'Achieving Business Compliance' Programme.  She has previously been the Public Policy Director at Ofcom, where she played a major role in shaping Ofcom’s work on issues like improving mobile and broadband coverage across the UK, and working with the Government on new regulation to protect people from harmful content online.  She also sponsored Ofcom’s diversity and inclusion strategy. Before that she spent two decades in Whitehall departments, mainly in social policy roles.  She has held Senior Civil Service roles in the Ministry of Justice, the Cabinet Office and the Northern Ireland Office.

Dr Lisa Ackerley, Independent Chartered Environmental Health Practitioner, RSPH Professorial Fellow, and Winston Churchill Fellow. Lisa is chair of the Food Alert Technical Advisory Board, and Chair of the Board of the Reckitt Global Hygiene Institute. She has worked in as an enforcement officer, in academia, in central government, as an expert witness and has run food safety consultancies for over 30 years. She is passionate about making hygiene and safety easy to understand, developing practical, easy to follow guidance which clarifies what is needed to comply with the law and what is best practice. Lisa is also a Trustee and Scientific Adviser to the charity IFH, which provides scientific advice on home and everyday life https://www.ifh-homehygiene.org.

Mark Flanagan is CEO of Shield Safety and founder of Safe to Trade. He is a Chartered Environmental Health Practitioner, a Fellow of the Institute of Food Science and Technology and Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health.With over 20 years of industry experience, Mark is committed to driving safety standards and believes in the power of standardised audit sets to improved food safety inspections and to protect consumers. His dedication and leadership is evidenced by Safe to Trade, and his ongoing focus is on driving further growth, awareness and adoption of Safe to Trade in order to achieve a safer and more reliable food industry.

Matthew Bazeley-Bell, Deputy Chief Executive, RSPH. Matthew has over 20 years’ experience working in the health and central government including leading the NHS’ public health services in London. He is a charity trustee for the Bristol Folk House which helps its community to ‘learn, make, create, and appreciate’ and he co-founded ‘Out to Swim Bristol’ and led the establishment of it as a national organisation and movement for inclusion in aquatics and sport.

Melissa Haskell, Partner in the Regulatory & Licensing Teams, Knights. Melissa is a Regulatory and Food Safety Partner at Knights; the largest regional legal services business in the UK. A unique business; the first to move ownership and management from partners, allowing dedication to our clients, delivering premium services with speed, accessibility and high levels of communication. Knights boasts a full range of legal services and provide advice to support businesses in their growth plans. Melissa specialises in pan-regulatory issues from health, safety and licensing to professional misconduct. Melissa started her career as a Solicitor- Advocate at a Criminal and Regulatory practise and later spent time in-house as a Regulatory Lawyer at Bristol City Council she carries a wealth of experience supporting clients with regulatory matters in sectors from both a prosecution and defence approach, with wide-ranging expertise in food-safety, education, health and social care and white-collar crime.

Michael Hughes is a Senior Environmental Health Officer at Knowsley Metropolitan Borough Council on Merseyside. Mike qualified as an EHP in 2004 and has worked for three separate authorities working in the enforcement of food safety, health and safety, and animal welfare legislation. He is currently the lead officer for food safety at Knowsley Council. Mike has experience inspecting and enforcing food safety law at a wide range of food businesses.

Professor Robin May, Chief Scientific Adviser at the Food Standards Agency (FSA) and Professor of Infectious Disease at the University of Birmingham. Professor May, took up his role as the Chief Scientific Adviser (CSA) for the Food Standards Agency (FSA) in July 2020. As the FSA’s Chief Scientific Adviser, he provides expert scientific advice to the UK government and plays a critical role in helping to understand how scientific developments will shape the work of the FSA, as well as the strategic implications of any possible changes. He is responsible for the integrity of the science and evidence that underpins FSA activities, as well as for communicating the FSA’s evidence-based approach to other government departments, external stakeholders and consumers.  Professor May’s early training was in Plant Sciences at the University of Oxford, followed by a PhD on mammalian cell biology at University College London and the University of Birmingham. After postdoctoral research on gene silencing at the Hubrecht Laboratory, The Netherlands, he returned to the UK in 2005 to establish a research program on human infectious diseases. He was Director of the Institute of Microbiology and Infection at the University of Birmingham from 2017-2020. He continues his work on Infectious Disease at the University of Birmingham. A Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and the Academy of Medical Sciences, Professor May also specialises in research into human infectious diseases, with a particular focus on how pathogens survive and replicate within host organisms. In May 2022 he was appointed as the 39th Gresham Professor of Physic, a role in which he provides public lectures on medicine, health and related sciences.