Sentencing individuals for food safety and food hygiene offences


Produced in partnership with Richard Heller of Drystone Chambers
Practice notes

Sentencing individuals for food safety and food hygiene offences


Produced in partnership with Richard Heller of Drystone Chambers

Practice notes
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This Practice Note reviews the parts of the Sentencing Council’s offence-specific guidelines which are used by the magistrates’ courts and Crown Courts in England and Wales when sentencing individuals for food safety and food hygiene offences. In accordance with section 59 of the Sentencing Act 2020 (SA 2020) (known as the Sentencing Code), the courts must follow Sentencing Council guidelines in sentencing an offender unless ‘satisfied that it would be contrary to the interests of justice to do so’.

The Sentencing Council has published offence-specific guidelines for food safety and hygiene offences.

Separate guidelines apply for the sentencing of organisations for these offences, see Practice Note: Sentencing organisations for food safety and food hygiene offences.

The Sentencing Council also publishes a number of overarching guidelines, which should be considered in respect of all sentencing exercises, see Practice Note: Sentences imposed following conviction. Among these, the General guideline—overarching principles (the General guideline) is specifically designed to be used in conjunction with offence-specific guidelines and covers seriousness as well as providing expanded

Richard Heller
Richard Heller

Drystone Chambers

Richard is a specialist practitioner with considerable experience across the spectrum of regulatory crime with an emphasis on trading standards and food safety. His headline practice areas also include health and safety, fraud, planning enforcement and confiscation. He acts for a number of regulators and defends both individuals and businesses.

He has appeared in leading authorities concerning intellectual property crime (R v Brayford [2011] 1 Cr. App. R. (S.) 107), abuse of process and costs (Focus (DIY) v Hillingdon Council [2008] All ER (D) 117), listed building offences (R v Rance [2013] Crim. L.R. 74) and planning enforcement (R v Kohali [2016] 1 Cr. App. R. (S.) 30).

He has acted in some of the most serious cases concerning outbreaks of food-poisoning (three involving fatalities) and in two of the largest prosecutions taken by trading standards services in England, in addition to many other major operations.

He has been instructed by the National Trading Standards Board to advise on the enforcement of new legislation and has spoken at the last seven annual conferences of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute. Richard has lectured and written extensively on his practice areas and has been published in 'Local Government Lawyer', 'Trading Standards Today' and Kingsley Napley's 'The Regulator'.

In 2012, Richard was appointed to the Unified List of Specialist Regulatory Lawyers in Health and Safety and Environmental Law.

Since 2010, Richard has been listed in Chambers & Partners as a leading barrister in Consumer Law where he is commended for 'combining substantial skill with a steady reassuring hand' and for having 'vast technical knowledge'.

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