Horsemeat: Schools And Hospitals To Be Tested

<p dir=ltr>Meals in schools and hospitals will be tested for horsemeat as part of a nationwide probe into processed beef products, the Environment Secretary has told Sky News.Speaking ahead of an emergency summit with food producers, supermarkets and health officials, Owen Paterson, when asked if it was likely that school and hospital meals contained horsemeat, said: "We will be testing those as well, alongside products in retailers."The Government has been unable to guarantee that state-provided food does not contain horsemeat.The talks come as the retailer Aldi confirmed some of its ready meals contained 100% horsemeat, while Findus has admitted that it knew its products were affected more than a week ago.Mr Paterson told Sky News that horsemeat in food labelled as beef-products was "completely, totally unacceptable".He said he was "determined to get to the bottom" of the matter and to see if "it is gross incompetence or a serious criminal conspiracy".The Environment Secretary added that "retailers are ultimately responsible for what they sell".The Food Standards Agency (FSA) will also attend today's meeting. It has ordered all British retailers and processors to test all their processed beef products to make sure they are what they say they are.Mr Paterson said they would examine how the existing system works and how horsemeat got into the food network at the summit. Meanwhile, the Aldi supermarket chain has confirmed that two of its ready meal ranges produced by Comigel, the French supplier also used by Findus, were found to contain between 30% and 100% horse meat.The dishes affected are Today's Special frozen beef lasagne and Today's Special frozen spaghetti Bolognese.The company said it felt "angry and let down" by Comigel and that anyone who had bought the affected products was entitled to a full refund.Police have joined in the investigation into the horsemeat scandal. Officers from Scotland Yard have met with the FSA to discuss its probe.Comigel, the company at the centre of the latest scare, whose headquarters are based in Luxembourg, has told the AFP news agency that the horsemeat originated in a Romanian abattoir.The meat was supplied to Comigel by a meat-processing company called Spanghero, based in southwestern France.The scandal has spread across continental Europe, with Findus withdrawing various frozen meals from both France and Sweden.Speaking from Luxembourg, Sky News Home Affairs Correspondent Mark White said authorities now faced a "complex and very difficult investigative process" to trace the contaminated meat.He said authorities had acknowledged that the meat may have come from more than one source. "The French and the Luxembourg authorities say they have traced the contaminated meat to a supplier in France, but it's not as simple as that."They say there are multiple other suppliers into this French company and tracing them back to the source is proving much more problematic."Politicians and food safety experts have played down the risk to human health, with Prime Minister David Cameron saying it was not about food safety, but about accurate food labelling.He said the industry would have to work hard to restore consumer confidence.Meanwhile, Labour MP Tom Watson has published a letter on his website which he claims was sent by Findus to retailers on Monday, warning that a France-based supplier had told it there may be problems with raw materials delivered since August 1 last year.In it, the firm claimed raw materials delivered to a French contractor since August 1 were "likely to be non-conform and consequently the labelling on finished products is incorrect".The letter added: "The supplier has asked us to withdraw the raw material batches."Responding to the claims, Findus said they did not know about problems back in August and that they first suspected an issue on January 22, when they ordered the initial tests.The product recall was ordered on February 2 after further tests had been conducted.