Food Safety
The Food Safety (General Food Hygiene) Regulations 1995, which are applicable in the United Kingdom, set out requirements for food businesses, including commercial kitchen owners and managers, to ensure the safety and hygiene of food handling practices.
The regulations establish general hygiene requirements that must be followed by commercial kitchen owners and managers. These include maintaining clean and hygienic premises and equipment.
Fire Safety
The Regulatory Reform Order 2005, applicable in the United Kingdom, imposes legal duties on the responsible person(s) in non-domestic premises, including commercial kitchen owners/managers, to ensure the safety of occupants in case of fire. Here's how it relates to a commercial kitchen owner or manager:
- Responsible Person: The order requires the designation of a responsible person(s) within the commercial kitchen establishment who is responsible for fire safety. This individual is typically the owner, manager, or other person in control of the premises.
- Fire Risk Assessment: The responsible person must conduct a comprehensive fire risk assessment of the premises, taking into account the layout, use, and occupancy of the commercial kitchen. The assessment identifies fire hazards, evaluates the risk of fire occurring, and determines control measures to mitigate the risk.
- Fire Safety Measures: Based on the findings of the fire risk assessment, the responsible person must implement appropriate fire safety measures to prevent the outbreak of fire and to protect occupants in case of fire, including regular cleaning of an extraction system to a certified compliant standard.
Health & Safety
Under the provisions of the Health & Safety at Work Act 1974, it is the responsibility of the employer to ensure the health, safety and welfare of all parties. This includes staff and customers. An absence of adequate control renders the business operator liable to criminal action. The absence of an effective system for maintaining ventilation extraction systems could readily lead to fire and subsequent injury or death of either building occupants or of third parties such as fire officers. Any such event would be likely to result in legal action under the Health & Safety at Work Act 1974.
Corporate Manslaughter
The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007 is a landmark in law. For the first time, companies and organisations can be found guilty of corporate manslaughter as a result of serious management failures resulting in a gross breach of a duty of care.
Commercial kitchen owners/managers have a legal obligation to take proactive measures to identify and mitigate risks to health and safety in their premises. This includes conducting thorough risk assessments and implementing appropriate preventative measures as it relates to fire safety.
Insurance Claims
The management team should be aware that if a property insurer can show that the systems employed to protect an installation were inadequate and this led to the loss of all or part of a building, any claim can be disputed. Where the company loses a criminal case, any civil claim will inevitably fail as, under civil law, the burden of proof is on the balance of probabilities rather than beyond all reasonable doubt.
In short, if you neglect to clean your extraction system, you will not be able to claim damages on your insurance.