Examination of Witnesses (Questions 60
- 79)
WEDNESDAY 21 FEBRUARY 2007
MR DAVID STATHAM AND MRS SARAH APPLEBY
Q60 Chairman:
Questions will follow. Sarah, do you want to say anything in addition?
Mrs Appleby: No, thank you.
Q61 Lord Palmer:
Could I quickly ask—who was in charge before 1 July? Or
was there no control at all?
Mr Statham: Before 1 July the inspectors were
part of the Wine Standards Board, and that transferred to us on
1 July. The Wine Standards Board was a non-departmental public
body and was set up in 1973 with specific responsibility for the
EU wine regime, and this was a company that was sponsored by Defra
and the Vintners Company. That company was wound up on 1 July,
when the inspectorate came to us, and now they are a full part
of the government department as opposed to being a separate non-departmental
public body.
Q62 Viscount Brookeborough:
I think you said you have two full time equivalents working on
this?
Mr Statham: In the office, but most of the work
is the inspectors who are out on the ground, and there are eight
of those who are working doing the inspections.
Q63 Chairman:
Thank you very much indeed. We will ask the questions, and I think
you have had a copy of the questions that we intend to ask. If
we could lead off with the cost of the enforcement process. Please
tell us what that costs, if you could, who pays and what are the
linkages with the Customs Officers; and it would also be helpful
if you could tell us the precise status of the Wine Standards
Board. Those things would help us. The website described it four
years ago as a "non-profit making company limited by guarantee"
but it now appears to have been brought in-house, as you have
already said. So in that case why was the change of status made?
I also hope that you can elucidate, in layman's terms, some of
the complexities of the labelling and the winemaking processes
with which your Agency is concerned. We all have thoughts on labelling
but we would like your views on how it is working, whether it
is working and whether in fact people actually read these labels
in the way that they should.
Mr Statham: Absolutely. As I have already explained,
the team consists of wine standards inspectors who go out and
enforce the rules, and a very small team at head office that deals
with the policy and the administration. There are no charges made
for these inspections, so this is a government—funded piece
of work, and it currently costs around £400,000, half a million,
something of that order a year to run this service, depending
on how much of Sarah's time we charge and all of that—but
around £400,000 to half a million. Her Majesty's Revenue
and Customs deal with non-EU wine imports and they check certificates
of origin and analyses on our behalf, so they will check that
any non-EU wine that is imported has the right certification and
the right analysis. Just to explain a little about how the Wine
Standards Board came to be part of the FSA, this was as a result
of the report I am sure you heard of from Hampton, who in March
2005 did a report recommending that enforcement activity in England
should be simplified and that the number of enforcement bodies
should be reduced. One of his recommendations was that the Wine
Standards Board should be transferred to the Food Standards Agency.
So we negotiated that with our colleagues in Defra and, as I have
already explained, the non-departmental body was wound-up and
it became a full part of the Agency and the staff are now civil
servants and work in Sarah's group. As far as the labelling is
concerned, you are extremely correct when you say that it is complicated
and difficult to understand. There are all sorts of bits and pieces
that make up the labelling. There is some mandatory information
that has to be on the label; there is some optional information;
there is information about different categories of wine; there
is a distinction between wine produced in the EU and non-EU wine;
and then there are issues around quality wine regions and vine
variety descriptions. So there is a whole range of different things.
And, if that sounds complicated enough, it becomes even more complicated
when you realise that some of the mandatory information is mandatory
for some wines but not for others. For example, EU wines are required
to state the type of wine—claret or burgundy or something
of that sort—but third country wines do not have to. So
certain things are mandatory for some wines and not for others.
Some information, however, is mandatory for all wine. For example,
all wines have to state the alcohol strength. Then there is optional
information which is largely designed to protect the quality end
of the market, but in some cases there is some information that
is optional, which is not optional for some wines because you
cannot use it even though it is optional. So it is not at all
straightforward. For example, something like table wine, you cannot
state the vine variety—you are not allowed to do that—nor
could you state the vintage if it had a vintage. So it is not
a simple process, it is extremely difficult—far more complex
than ordinary food labelling, which is a lot more straightforward
and a lot simpler.
Q64 Chairman:
Thank you very much. If this Committee decided, having heard what
you said, that the labelling ought to be simplified, would you
be prepared to say to us, "Yes, I would be prepared to sit
down and suggest what could be done which would lead to that simplification"?
Mr Statham: Yes, absolutely. It is a very pertinent
time as well to be thinking about that because, as you are probably
aware, the EU is looking at food labelling as a whole at the present
time and I think there are quite a number of lessons coming out
of that exercise that we could directly relate to in the wine
sector, so I think that would be an extremely useful and profitable
piece of work.
Q65 Viscount Brookeborough:
Before I ask my question, you said that the cost of these inspections
and regulations was £400,000 to £500,000 per year. Is
there any reason why wine producers should not be paying that?
After all, in other agricultural activities we have to have our
cattle tested in various ways and we now have to pay.
Mr Statham: In order to charge for inspections
there has to be a statutory capability to do that and that does
exist in a number of areas, as you suggest, and it exists in a
number of areas in the food area. Because wine is regulated separately,
as far as I am aware the statutory instrument does not give us
that opportunity to recover the cost. But, again, as part of the
reform, particularly since it is now appropriate in a number of
other areas in food, we could seriously suggest that that would
be the case. It would certainly make an awful lot of sense.
Q66 Viscount Brookeborough:
Could you tell us in general terms how other EU Member States
go about enforcing the application of the wine sector regulations?
Could it be said, for instance, that the UK approach is more or
less zealous than that employed by others?
Mr Statham: I think generally the work of the
regulators in this sector is very similar across Europe and a
lot of it is about education and advice, but there is very little
in terms of prosecution or formal enforcement. Much of it is trying
to get changes on a voluntary basis, and I guess most Member States
take a similar approach. One of the things that I have learnt
over the years in dealing with other Member States in relation
to food enforcement is that they all claim that they are more
zealous than any other country and that everybody else is allowing
the food industry to get away with murder. So I think there is
a fairly common approach across the Community. We do have regular,
informal contacts with our opposite numbers in other wine—producing
countries just to try and ensure that there are similar approaches,
and also, of course, DG Agri have auditors that carry out audits
of the competent authorities and their enforcement regimes to
ensure Member States are enforcing the legislation with a level
playing field. The last audit in the UK was carried out in 2003,
I think.
Q67 Viscount Brookeborough:
Do you think that in some of the other countries is not so much
the Member States but it is the powerful wine growers who are
protecting their own little world as far as labelling and uniformity
of practices go?
Mr Statham: There is certainly evidence that
the wine industry being such an historic industry has a lot of
historic practices which may not relate in any way to safety or
consumer protection and relate probably to protection of the producers.
It is also perhaps important to point out that in some cases our
enforcement is a bit different because obviously we are a very
small producer but a very big importer, so much of our enforcement
work is designed to try and ensure that what is coming through
the ports is satisfactory and acceptable, and many of the other
big producers will be less concerned about imports and more concerned,
as you suggest, about protecting their own industry.
Q68 Viscount Brookeborough:
Do producers in other countries pay for this regulation ? Or is
it like ours?
Mr Statham: As far as I am aware, it is a similar
process throughout the whole of the European Union.
Q69 Viscount Brookeborough:
It must be a fairly large bill.
Mr Statham: Absolutely.
Q70 Viscount Brookeborough:
If I could now go on to the third question. Could you explain
to us how the Geographical Indication, the GI markings, is defined?
We heard a couple of weeks ago from Defra about GI markings being
`owned'. What exactly does that mean? And how does it affect your
enforcement role in this country?
Mr Statham: Sarah is going to take that one.
Mrs Appleby: The Geographical Indication marking
is defined by each Member State. They can specify an area of production,
vine varieties, grape yields, minimum alcohol levels and perhaps
ageing requirements, and these all go up to making a specific
type of wine with this GI marking. For example, at the moment
in Member States there are about 10,000 of these GIs in use and
so that makes it very difficult for interpretation of the labels
without considerable prior knowledge and understanding of all
these different vine types and varieties and the different recipes
effectively that go into making each of these different types
of wine. These are protected under EC regulations, so if you are
in a different area you cannot use a GI marking for somebody else,
and it is the wine standards inspectors who are looking at the
labels to ensure that there is no misinterpretation and no fraudulent
use of these labels and that consumers are not being misled.
Q71 Viscount Brookeborough:
Is this one of the major differences between Europe and perhaps
the New World?
Mrs Appleby: Increasingly the New World are
coming up with similar markings; I think a GI indication may cover
all of South Australia, for example, which is very different perhaps
from Bordeaux or claret, or those kind of things.
Q72 Chairman:
Before we come on to the next question, you referred earlier to
the fact that your role is dealing with imported wines, and in
particular checking, and you said this is a non-cost on imported
wines too. How are they checked? And who does the checking?
Mrs Appleby: At the point of import Customs
would actually be looking at the imports, obviously because of
the levy of tax that they want to collect, and they would be identifying,
perhaps, new sources or different sources or higher levels of
alcohol, for example. But also the Customs Officers in their own
paperwork would be checking for the certificates of analysis on
our behalf.
Q73 Chairman:
If necessary would they be opening the bottle?
Mrs Appleby: It may come to that, yes.
Mr Statham: Then obviously, when they go perhaps
into the bonded warehouses or when they go down to the wholesalers,
the retailers, that is when our inspectors and the local authority
inspectors will also be checking these things on imported wines.
Q74 Viscount Brookeborough:
Just very quickly, in Paragraph 29 of your evidence you say, "New
exporting non-EU countries are often unsure of the statutory requirements
... and the imports may be rejected." Are they actually rejected?
Mrs Appleby: We have had occasions where we
have rejected wines, yes.
Q75 Lord Moynihan:
My Lord Chairman, to pick up on your question. Do you look into
the accuracy of the certification analysis or do your inspectors
also, even at the retail end for example, take random samples
of wine to tests its alcohol strength? If so, what process do
you use to confirm that that alcohol strength is right? Is it
a simple test? Or could you explain to us how that actually works?
Mrs Appleby: We would use public analysts for
testing. The details of the test I am not sure of, and obviously
there are a variety of tests that can be used. You can drop beads
and things in to test alcoholic strength, but I am not an expert.
But we would use a recognised public analyst who is able to undertake
tests and certify the results.
Q76 Lord Moynihan:
If there were a sample that did not match its description, you
would prosecute?
Mrs Appleby: That is one option, yes, certainly.
Q77 Lord Moynihan:
Have you done so for any imported wine or taken it up with governments
of the relevant countries? And do you have a relationship with
those governments which would allow prosecutions to take place
in the country of origin?
Mrs Appleby: As far as I am aware, on 165 occasions
in the last year—this is 2005-06, before they came under
the Food Standards Agency—wine standards inspectors served
detention notices on imported wine. Some of those would be going
for analysis and further testing and on the basis of that we are
aware that at least one or two were rejected. I am not aware that
a prosecution took place. It may be that it was a first import
and so in view of the situation it was not a deliberate intent
to mislead consumers, but that is something that can be taken
if we need to.
Q78 Lord Palmer:
To follow up on that. Is there a margin of error which is allowed
if, for example, a wine says five% alcohol and it is in fact 5.75%?
Is there a recognised margin on which you do not take action?
Mrs Appleby: I think the standards for wine,
again the percentage alcohol limits, are prescribed and there
may be a number of samples which you take, so you average out
the alcohol levels, because if they vary enormously you are looking
at the average levels. I do not know if that is any help.
Mr Statham: Again, as with all analytical techniques
there will be a built-in margin of error and, if it was extremely
close to the line, again it would probably be the form of a letter
saying, "We have analysed this, it was slightly over but
we are not taking formal action on the basis of this because it
is very close, but you should get it right in future". And,
if it was outside the margin of error, then that is where formal
enforcement is more likely to be taken.
Mrs Appleby: But taking up your point, we do
have contact with our opposite numbers in other countries as well
as other Member States to talk about these kinds of issues, to
identify where there may be particular problems, where we may
need to do further surveillance work.
Q79 Baroness Jones of Whitchurch:
Can I follow that up because, as you know, in the past there have
been a couple of big scandals about wine being adulterated, so
we are not talking about accident alcohol levels, but major issues.
Do you have a system of liaising with your colleagues abroad?
Obviously if that were to happen, then wine from one vineyard
could go all around the world and you would need to pick it up
very quickly, to know that it had been adulterated in some way.
Do you have a surveillance level almost like a policing role at
that level?
Mrs Appleby: Certainly the Food Standards Agency
is familiar with dealing and identifying with particular concerns
about food and, if we picked up particular problems associated
with public health or contamination, we would immediately alert
the EU in terms of the rapid alert system for food. It is a central
body within the EU who would disseminate that information amongst
other Member States and further identification or tests would
be done of that same product on sale in other countries. It may
be dependent on the nature of the problem that a food would be
stopped, we would identify and trace where it had come from and
where it had gone to and we could either put it on hold pending
further analysis or make arrangements for destruction. And that
would be the case for any other food.
Mr Statham: In addition to that, we would mobilise
colleagues in the local authorities to ensure that, if any of
it was on sale, it was seized at the point of sale and removed
so that consumers were protected. We have had a few examples in
this country, not of wine of that nature but of spirits, where
there have been counterfeit spirits and they have included harmful
alcohol as well as ethanol. Methanol has been in there, and in
that case that very process was followed, rapid alert systems
were issued across Europe and products were seized from the stores
where they were on sale because obviously it is a very serious
public health issue, and we have a way of moving to get that done
very quickly.
| 
