We would like to take this opportunity to congratulate a number of our clients on their recent achievements.

Firstly, long standing ESB client, BaxterStorey, have fought off competition from incumbent supplier Compass Group to land the catering contract with British Airways. The deal, estimated to be worth in excess of £20million per year, will see BaxterStorey responsible for all of the airline's First Class and Galleries lounges, as well as the Concorde room at Heathrow Terminal 5. BMI airport lounges are also rumoured to be part of the deal. Congratulations to all involved.

Over the past few weeks a number of local authorities across England have rolled out the Food Standards Agency's Food Hygiene Rating Scheme. This includes local authorities in London, Cumbria, Kent, Oxfordshire and the Tees Valley. There are now more than 250 local authorities in England, Wales and Northern Ireland publishing more than 200,000 food hygiene ratings at food.gov.uk/ratings.

I am going to take this opportunity to give my two penneth’s worth on the contract catering, leisure and hotel industries. All too often I feel rather bewildered in this organisation when the consultants are discussing the complexities of HACCP, the risks of Sous Vide cooking and the juxtaposition between new age tablet auditing against the merits of pen and paper auditing. This is my time to shed light on the weekly going’s on in our target sectors.

The rant