{"id":160138,"date":"2025-09-25T19:36:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T19:36:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/160138\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T19:36:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T19:36:12","slug":"heavy-fine-for-asda-in-huyton-after-what-inspectors-found","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/160138\/","title":{"rendered":"Heavy fine for Asda in Huyton after what inspectors found"},"content":{"rendered":"

Knowsley Council confirmed it has successfully prosecuted the supermarket giant<\/p>\n

18:46, 25 Sep 2025Updated 18:47, 25 Sep 2025<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Asda store in Huyton(Image: Liverpool Echo)<\/p>\n

Asda in Huyton has been fined \u00a3130,000 today, Thursday (September 25), after inspectors found 59 separate safety issues with foods displayed around the store. Knowsley<\/a> Council confirmed it brought the court case against the supermarket<\/a> and said it has successfully prosecuted the retail company for selling unsafe food.<\/p>\n

The site in Huyton<\/a> Village is one of the largest Asda<\/a> supermarkets on Merseyside. As well as its staple food shopping offer, the Asda in Huyton also includes a pharmacy, an opticians and more pertinently, a caf\u00e9 and restaurant area.<\/p>\n

The retail store was officially opened in 2005 and underwent a large-scale refurbishment in 2016 which saw the installation of a Decathlon sports shop and an American-style express diner.<\/p>\n

The prosecution follows inspections of Huyton\u2019s Asda Superstore on February 14, 2024 and March 20, 2024 by Knowsley Council<\/a>\u2019s environmental health team. During these inspections, officers found 59 items of food on sale after the use by date had expired.<\/p>\n

Asda Stores Ltd appeared before Liverpool and Knowsley Magistrates\u2019 Court today (September 25) and pleaded guilty to six charges of breaching the Food Safety and Hygiene (England) Regulations 2013 by placing unsafe food on the market.<\/p>\n

\"Asda,Asda, Huyton<\/p>\n

The company was fined \u00a3130,000 and ordered to pay \u00a311,000 in costs to the council.<\/p>\n

The council said officers had previously discovered food with an expired use by date on sale and had warned the company that they needed to improve the checking of use by dates in the store.<\/p>\n

Despite these warnings, the council said officers found 59 items of food on sale after the use by date had expired when they returned to the store, including 26 packets of ham, 10 packets of cheesecake, eight cartons of Cr\u00e8me Fraiche, four packets of smoky BBQ tasty bites, four packets of deliciously vegan no chorizo slices, two packets of smoked salmon, two chicken and bacon bakes, one toffee sundae, one packet of corned beef and one packet of \u2018Nduja & Regato Cheese Pinwheels.<\/p>\n

The packet of pinwheels found to be on sale 18 days after the use by date had expired.<\/p>\n

A council investigation found the company had not put in place \u201cadequate steps to remove foods from sale\u201d before the expiry of the use by date.<\/p>\n

Use by dates are applied to highly perishable foods that could become unsafe to eat if kept for too long. Harmful bacteria can grow to dangerous levels in food without the food spoiling or looking off.<\/p>\n

These bacteria have the potential to cause serious illness, particularly in vulnerable and elderly people.<\/p>\n

The use by date is the date until which the manufacturer can guarantee that the food is safe to eat. Food is legally to be considered to be unfit if kept after the use by date has expired.<\/p>\n

The prosecution brought by the council follows Asda receiving heavy fines following recent similar prosecutions brought by Derby City Council and Cornwall Council for selling food that had expired use by dates.<\/p>\n

Cllr Shelley Powell, cabinet member for communities and neighbourhoods, said: \u201cIt\u2019s really important that retailers adhere to the law and ensure that consumers aren\u2019t put at any risk due to items being available to buy when the use by date has already expired.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will continue to routinely check food businesses to ensure there are no food breaches and take robust action against anyone who is not complying with the law.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Knowsley Council confirmed it has successfully prosecuted the supermarket giant 18:46, 25 Sep 2025Updated 18:47, 25 Sep 2025…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":160139,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[724,84,1343,59,2513,34486,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-160138","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-asda","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-courts","11":"tag-gb","12":"tag-huyton","13":"tag-knowsley-council","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom","16":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=160138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/160138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/160139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=160138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=160138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=160138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}