Rogue caterers who supply food to the UK’s corporate aircraft industry are, in some cases, running their businesses out of a garage, according to Castle Kitchen’s sales director Erica Sheward. Sheward told EBAN: “People are very clever at giving the impression that they have smart literature and even a refrigerated vehicle but sometimes that belies the situation where people are literally running the business out of their garage or their home.

“While food safety legislation is blanket throughout Europe, following the 1990 Food Safety Act, it is very difficult to enforce.

“There is no legislation which says who can and who can’t supply food to a corporate aircraft. You can run a food business in the UK from your home but it is not necessarily the right environment to provide food to corporate aviation.”

John Dyson, who works as Alpha Flight Catering’s environmental health and safety advisor and also sits on several Food Standards Agency committees, was not in agreement. He told EBAN: “There certainly is legislation which governs the production of safe food in any operation in the UK. It is very strongly regulated. I don’t know anyone who is working out of their garage or home, to supply food to the corporate aviation industry in the UK.

“The penalties are very stringent these days and are applied, so I’m stunned by what Erica Sheward

is saying.”

Sheward countered: “Yes, strictly speaking, you have to be registered with your local authority but there is a massive difference with corporate aviation. They rely on you to voluntarily state the nature of your food business.

“There are plenty of corporate aviation suppliers who won’t declare the nature of their business to the local Environmental Health Officer (EHO) because of the many environmental issues involved in putting food on private aeroplanes. What’s more, EHOs are totally overloaded with other work and don’t always have time to investigate further.

“There’s one guy who runs his corporate jet catering business out of his pub and had never declared the nature of his business to his EHO, until I declared it for him. The EHO went round, had an absolute fit and within three months, he had to spend £30,000 refitting his kitchen.

The EHO would never have guessed that he was supplying food to corporate jets because to look at, it’s just a pub kitchen.”

Across the water in Amsterdam, B-Wing (caterer to KLM General Aviation) spokesman Pieter Blum said: “We have to obey the laws of KLM and the Dutch government. The Dutch government requires a lot

of paperwork.”

EBAN asked Blum if it would be possible in Holland, to supply food to the corporate aircraft industry out of a garage. He said: “It might be possible for one week but then they would check up on you. When you run your own business in Holland, you have to declare it to the government and they will check you.