How Rockhampton, Yeppoon, Gladstone, Emerald food businesses fared in food safety report

A new report has revealed how many improvement notices and infringements where handed to Central Queensland food businesses following inspections carried out in the past year. Here’s how they fared.

Central Queensland’s licensed food businesses have gone under the microscope with a new report showing how many complaints, inspections and compliance notices were issued to local venues in the 2020-21 financial year.

The 2020-21 annual report on local government activities under the Food Act 2006 was published earlier this year by Queensland Health.

The annual report breaks down how many inspections and improvement notices were conducted and distributed across local government areas around the state.

According to the report, the number of licensed food businesses in Queensland was 32,427, representing a 1.8 per cent increase (582 businesses) from the 2019-20 period.

According to the data released in the report, a total of 774 inspections were carried out at the 563 food licenced businesses in the Rockhampton Regional Council LGA.

Of those, 549 were routine inspections and 196 were reinspections, while 29 of them were compliance inspections.

The report says the most inspections for a single venue was five.

There were also 50 complaints made, however there were no improvement notices issued and no prosecutions for the RRC region.

The report says there were no food licenced venues in the RRC region that were prosecuted or had a licence suspended or cancelled after receiving a show cause notice.

Meanwhile in across the 216 licenced food venues in Livingstone, there were 216 inspections.

Of those inspections, 171 were routine, while there were 47 reinspections and four compliance inspections.

The report says the most times a single venue was inspected was four, with eight improvement notices issues in the Livingstone council area.

Fifteen complaints were made, however like the RRC area, there were no improvement notices issued and no prosecutions and no venues had their food licences suspended or cancelled after receiving a show cause notice.

The latest food safety act report has revealed how many inspections were carried out and how many infringements were issued across CQ food licenced businesses.

In the Gladstone council area, a total of 469 inspections were carried out across the 301 licenced food businesses in the area.

Of these inspections, 394 of them were routine, 68 were reinspections and seven were compliance checks.

The report data says the most inspections carried out at one premises was seven, and 35 complaints were made.

According to the report, 15 improvement notices were issued at businesses in the Gladstone region with one prescribed infringement notice (PIN) issued.

The reports says PINs can be issued when “offences pose a moderate threat to human health and safety, or where there are indications of previous, current and ongoing noncompliance”.

In the Banana Shire Council area, a total of 190 inspections were carried out across the 111 food licenced businesses in the region.

Of those inspections, 103 were routine with 80 reinspections and seven compliance inspections – there were eight complaints made.

In the BSC region, 14 improvement notices were issued and three prescribed infringement notices were handed out.

Meanwhile in the Central Highlands, after 187 total inspections across the council areas’ 194 food licenced businesses, there were no improvement notices or infringements issued.

Of the inspections carried out in the CHRC area, 168 were routine, while nine were reinspections and 10 were compliant inspections.

The most inspections carried out at a single premises were four, with only seven complaints made.

According to the report, there was a 13.6 per cent decrease in improvement notices issued across the state.

In the 2020-21 period 2284 improvements were issued compared to the 2642 issued in the 2019-20 period.

There was also a 33.4 per cent decrease in PINs issued.

In the 2020-21 period, 295 total PINs were issued, compared to a total of 443 in 2019-20.