UKC

I believe that the major supermarkets are a significant force in horse meat appearing in beef products.

Its the buying power of the major chains such as Tesco and Morrison's squeezing profit margins with the supplier that people have had to go to extremes to sell their products further down the supply chain.

In reply to The Lemming:
and?

if one is going to eat a cow, then why not eat a horse?

i see no difference

In reply to The Lemming: An oldie boy on television yesterday saying how he LOVED his Findus burgers.......but was not going to eat them now he knew what was in them - why the hell not???

In reply to The Lemming: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2013/feb/09/horsemeat-scandal-responsibi...

What utter bollocks! The responsibility lies with whoever it was that sold horse as beef. You may as well go a stage further and blame the consumer!

In reply to The Lemming

What shocked me was that the findus lasagne is only 10% meat regardless of what species it is!

In reply to The Lemming:

Given that most people don't seem to care that there was horse in it - just are concerned that if they apparently don't even know what species the meat they source comes from then how do they have any idea that other standards are being followed - then surely they can just start labelling how much horse content is in cheapo packaged meats.

In reply to Submit to Gravity:

Retailers like Tesco already do audits all down the chain of their suppliers - I know, the company I work for get's audited because we supply a supplier of Tesco (we produce packaging, which goes to our customer who supplies the product and sends it to Tesco)

There's only so far you can go. And just because horsemeat is in the news doesn't mean that's the only thing you can test for - there must be thousands of things you could test for in thousands of products to check things are what they say they are, there's only so far you can take it.

I don't know if retailers should be doing more to check the sources of their products but from the things I am aware of they already do go down the line to ensure certain standards so I can't see that it's really their fault.

In reply to Jaffacake:

I agree. It's a bizarre trend in society now to blame people other than those who committed the act.

In reply to Skip:

Because I've paid for beef, not horse? Now if it said 'horse' on the label and was cheaper than the beef the I'd be fine with it. As it is I've been mis-sold cheaper meat. Plus I suspect if the supplier will chuck horse meat in they'll also have no scruples about adding meat designated as pet food or stuff going a bit green round the edges.

In reply to Jaffacake: i think you have a great deal of confidence in these companys because you adhere to rules/standards/legislation, i struggle to trust supermarkets as they have been proven to lie again and again.they have lied about price reductions,fixing prices of butter,milk and quality of products.i work in the food production sector and i am aware that meat of unknown origin is used by companys producing food for the multiples.Horse meat is just like any other,the difference with this meat is that it is of unknown origin,were these animals treated with drugs that could be seriously damaging to humans? My guess is probably yes,how was this meat stored and where? Clearly Tescos and others do not test all their products like they would have us believe,had they this would have been discovered earlier,perhaps it was?
I want to know how this has been allowed to happen,we have been lied to by these companys and the goverment and previous goverment.The goverment spends a lot of money tracing meat all the way down the line,although now we have the proof they dont!
Does that mean we cannot trust anything that is displayed on food packaging?
You cant trust the producer and despite the amount of money the goverment spends on traceabillity they only find there is a problem is when an inspector throws in a random test!
Well so much for the goverments very strict regulations!
My advice shop local,with small producers with whom you can build a relationship and actually see the raw ingredients of which your food is produced,if you cant do this buy actual food(not processed) from stores that you can then process into meals yourself!
Its not rocket science,if its cheaper to buy a whole meal or burger than to buy the ingredients to make it,then its full of crap!

In reply to Skip:

If an animal is not intended for the food chain then you can give it all kinds of drugs, some of which are bad for humans.

The irony is that the truly harmful things in many of these products are the excessive amounts of saturated fat and salt. True, if something is sold as beef and is actually horse, then there's something wrong. But, these products have always been the basis of a very poor diet.

Fresh meat, vegetables, beans and potatoes, rice, pasta and noodles are just as cheap if you spare the time to buy them and cook them.

In reply to John1923:

Bute can be lethal in some people. 5 in 60 horses slaughtered in the UK destined for human consumption in the EU were found to contain it. Horses destined for human consumption are supposed to have passports that detail the drugs they've been given.

In the US racehorses were being sold for human consumption despite having illegal levels of all kinds of pharmaceuticals in them.

Horse isn't the problem, it's how the food chain has become corrupted that could be.

I'm nit aware that horse is cheaper than beef, but am aware that eastern Europeans may well be selling meat back to western europeans that isn't what they say it is.

In reply to Skip: presumably you feel that applies to cats, dogs,donkeys and just about anything that walks the earth.

I don't have a problem with anybody eating any meat from any creature, but I do have a problem with a packet that purports to be beef actually containing horse, or dog or rat for that matter.

Somebody has comitted a fraud on a massive scale and it needs sorting.

In reply to cragtaff: I think they need to stop being so certain it's all safe, as well. If some eastern European mafia are fork lifting discarded horse (or ???) carcassses into some giant mincer, they're hardly going to be terribly squeemish about how fit for human consumption it all is. 'Oh whoops, yes we're committing fraud on a grand scale but better not let Dobbin go in the pot, he's had a drug too many.'

In reply to The Lemming:

How do you accidentally mistake horse for beef when making a lasagne?

The answer is that you don't actually check it for taste or quality or any other cow-like characteristics.. because you're interested only in moving it on and making your profits.

Exactly the reason I don't buy this crap. Still, there are many people who don't care what rubbish they put in their mouths, so this will all blow over soon and the nation will be back to eating in blissful ignorance once again before you know it.