Volume 9: Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland
Part 2: Scotland
8. Statutory framework and responsibilities
Legislation on food safety

8.9 Where measures were being introduced specifically to protect human health, as in the case of the ban on Specified Bovine Offal (SBO) in food for human consumption, the legislative framework was not so straightforward. Until June 1990, separate legislation applied to Scotland on the one hand (the Food and Drugs (Scotland) Act 1956) and to England and Wales on the other (The Food Act 1984). This meant that separate Scottish Regulations had to be made for the SBO ban, to reflect the different parent legislation. The Food and Drugs (Scotland) Act 1956 gave the Secretary of State for Scotland the power to make Regulations in respect of food hygiene matters: including the inspection of animals intended for slaughter and of carcasses to ascertain whether their meat was fit for human consumption; ¹ and the requirements for staining, sterilisation or disposal of meat that was unfit for human consumption. ² While the meat hygiene arrangements for Scotland mostly mirrored those in England, an additional requirement in Scotland was that all animals entering the slaughterhouse had to undergo an ante-mortem examination by a meat inspector or, later, a qualified vet.

8.10 The Act also required consultation with interested parties before the making of most Orders or Regulations under it. ³ This meant that draft Regulations or Orders had to be published once in the Edinburgh Gazette and once at least in each of the two successive weeks in one or more newspapers circulating in the areas affected by the Regulations. If the Secretary of State wished to modify the terms of the draft at any stage, he was required to give additional notice of the amendment in a manner he thought appropriate.

8.11 In 1990 the Food Safety Act ⁴ replaced the Food Act 1984 (in England and Wales) and the Food and Drugs (Scotland) Act 1956, consolidating their separate provisions into one Act. The new Act retained the major provisions of the previous two Acts, but introduced a new regime of food law designed to control modern food manufacture and distribution practice. Under the 1990 Act it was possible to make joint Statutory Instruments applying to the whole of Great Britain, subject to consultation and negative resolution. ⁵