Camden Council have banned Sai Baba, who do a free community meal once a month for homeless and others in food poverty, from serving takeaways from the food that is left over after they’ve served everybody.
Sai Baba do a free two course Indian meal at Sommers Town Community Centre in Kings Cross on the 3rd Sunday of every month. For many years Sai Baba have giving takeaways on the way out from the food that was left over, but they have now been banned by Camden Council from doing so under food safety regulations because the food was cooked more than 2 hours previously. It is not possible for Sai Baba to serve the takeaways within 2 hours because the food is cooked at a volunteer’s home in Windsor that morning and taken to Sommers Town Community Centre.
I'm homeless and was relying on the takeaways to have dinner that evening and lunch and dinner the next day, but Sai Baba announced that they could no longer give us takeaways. In the end I asked for seconds and put it in containers I happened to have in my rucksack, but they were not allowed to put the food in my containers themselves because Camden Council have banned takeaways. But nobody else there had containers so were left going hungry without the takeaways they were expecting.
The food safety rules mean that homeless and other people in food poverty, who rely on Sai Baba’s takeaways to have dinner that day and lunch the next day, are left going hungry, while Sai Baba have been ordered to throw away the leftover food. Lovely paneer and chickpea curry going to waste.
The Sai Baba volunteers used to eat what was leftover after serving the takeaways, and they too are left without lunch.
Camden Council are leaving homeless people hungry while increasing food waste. Is this part of Camden Council’s drive to “end homelessness” in Camden by harassing homeless people out of Camden by stealing tents and sleeping bags from roughsleepers, and now they leave homeless people hungry?!
No other councils have such rules banning soup kitchens from giving leftover food as takeaways. I‘ve had takeaways from many different soup kitchens and outdoor food handouts across London for many years and never encountered any told by the council to stop giving out takeaways.
by LondonHomelessInfo
12 comments
Why do they have to interfere if they are. It going to provide the meals. That is just miserable frankly.
Camden Council are a nightmare. Sounds like the easiest option would be to find a venue in another borough.
> they have now been banned by Camden Council from doing so under food safety regulations because the food was cooked more than 2 hours previously
This is not true. Camden Council have no such rule, and have no power to prevent people taking away food even if they did. If the volunteers have chosen not to give takeaways, that’s their decision.
There are of course dozens of shelters in London that give out free food so there is no shortage if this particular venue doesn’t suit you. No one needs to rely on one place to get free food out of the many, many other options there are in the area.
If only someone left a big pile of takeaway containers somewhere nearby, and people just happened to fill up their own at the end…
This isn’t specific to Camden Council. The Food Standards Agency is very clear that cooked food prepared in advance must be kept above 63 degrees, or disposed of after two hours. Community kitchens must by law be held to some standards, and Camden Council can’t allow a community kitchen to disregard food safety guidelines: homeless people’s health is just as important as the health of people buying restaurant food and the same safety rules have to apply.
The community kitchen could find a more local volunteer so that cooked food doesn’t need to travel across the city from Windsor, or find a location where they can prep and cook on site and ensure cooked food is kept at appropriate temperatures – plenty of church halls have full cooking facilities.
Move location ? Right on the border edge of Camden but outside their jurisdiction
Throw them away into little individual bins neatly arranged on a table with lids
Labour council – thought they were the champions of the poor!
Disgraceful, what a waste on so many levels.
Just curious, where are the homeless people supposed to go?
This sounds so frustrating. If Sai Baba hasn’t already, it might be worth asking Camden Council’s environmental health team for advice on how they can go about not wasting the cooked food and be able to serve some as take away food. For example, is there any way Sai Baba can cool and refrigerate a portion of the cooked foods within two hours— by placing it in a fridge or cool bag within one to two hours. Are there facilities to reheat such as a microwave so the pre-cooled food can be reheated and distributed immediately? I know some community fridges allow cooked food to be stored and be taken by members of the public. The 2 hour “rule” is a widely recognised guideline, and if Sai Baba are able to ‘reset’ the clock through chilling or reheating, they might be able to serve the remainder as takeaway food.
“it has been banned due to food safety, due to the meals being cooked 2 hours prior”
I really don’t understand the anger here, Would you like homeless people to get stomach problems and diarrhoea themselves in some shop doorway?
There’s millions of places to get free food. Alternatively, get out of London and find a job like everyone else.
Sounds like a prohibition order from giving away food that falls outside of standard food safety controls.
All soup kitchens and similar I know of follow the same food hygiene rules as anyone else.
As awesome as it is to give away free food, it needs to be safe. Hot food should be served within two hours of falling below 63, (or chilled from 55c to 20c within two hours, then refrigerated). Cold food that isn’t under refrigeration (above 8c) has 4 hours.
When food is being given to homeless people, there’s even more risk as they have no further means of refrigeration.
If the organisers or anyone involved would like to reach out to me and send me a copy of the EHO report, I am more than happy to spend some time to give some advice.
I don’t really see an issue with this. The council is right in that just because it is a soup kitchen does not mean they are exempt from food safety rules…
Imagine the outraged if a large number of homeless got food poisoning/noro/listeria etc. Everyone would be out for blood for the council not enforcing basic food safety rules.
The answer here is to find a way to prepare the food while being compliant with safety rules.
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