A PUB owner from Teignbridge – who helped serve up two million meals during an unblemished 45-year career in the licensing trade – has been ordered to pay £2,578 in fines and costs for three breaches of food and hygiene safety.

Roger Haywood, 59, of Barn Cottage, Ipplepen, ran the Passage House Inn at Kingsteignton for nearly half-a-century.

His copy book was blotted when an environmental health team from Teignbridge Council made an unannounced inspection of the riverside premises last summer after receiving a complaint about the popular venue on the Teign.

Cllr Sylvia Russell, Teignbridge Council’s executive for health and wellbeing, said after the punishment was meted out by Torquay magistrates on Tuesday: ‘We take any breaches under Food Safety and Hygiene Regulations seriously.

‘As in any case, prosecution is deemed as a last resort and it is good news to hear that food hygiene standards have significantly improved along with food safety management controls being put into place.

‘Our Teignbridge food safety officers have consistently provided advice and guidance to the owner throughout this case.’

Mr Haywood pleaded guilty to five infringements, although fines were only imposed on three of them.

He was given 28 days to pay his financial penalty.

The court was told that inspectors visited the pub on August 13 when they found food areas had dirty and greasy floors, walls, pipework, switches and equipment.

A tin opener blade and surround was dirty and contained old food debris while a filthy utensil was discovered on the floor next to more food debris.

Walls in the dry refrigerator room and kitchen were in poor repair as was the kitchen floor and the silicone seal of a wash hand basin.

A carton of double cream was found to be four days past its use-by date.

And no current documented food safety management procedures were available to view.

Susan Mauger, prosecuting for the local authority, believed there had been a medium to high risk of food poisoning with the conditions found at the pub.

She added that food poisoning issues could affect some sufferers throughout their lives.

Magistrates told Mr Haywood that the conditions found at the pub posed ‘a clear risk of food contamination.’

They said pictures provided by the council clearly showed the greasy and dirty food areas described.

And documentation, they added, had been ‘woefully inadequate.’

Account had been taken of improvements made in the wake of the inspection with the venue’s food hygiene rating leaping from zero to four.

Ewen Macgregor, for Mr Haywood, disagreed with the council rating assessment, insisting the harm factor was at the ‘low risk’ level.

He said his client had an unblemished record over food poisoning issues throughout his 45-46 years in the business during which time he had overseen some two million food ‘covers.’

He said such a time span was ‘a significant period of time when his premises had not been a burden on the regulatory authorities.’

Mr Macgregor said it was to Mr Haywood’s credit that over this time there had never been a food poisoning or public health issue to contend with.

He revealed his client had suffered from ill-health since April 2015 – a few months before the inspection.

He told the court that the pub was deep-cleaned and declared fit for trading by the council just 24 hours after the inspection.

Most of the problem areas identified, he suggested, were either behind or beneath equipment – and as such did not affect food being served.

The offending tin opener, he told magistrates, had only been recently used when examined. And the dirty utensil found on the floor – a ladle – would have been picked up and cleaned before use.

Mr Macgregor accepted that documentation ‘could have been better’ – but argued that the fault did not ‘pose a significant threat to food being served at the premises.’

The carton of cream would have been checked and thrown away, he added. The oversight was an isolated incident.

He revealed that £500,000 had been spent updating the Passage House Inn during Mr Haywood’s lengthy tenure.

The court was told the business was now run by Mr Haywood’s son, Thomas, in the wake of his poor health.

His client had initially ‘stepped back’ from running the business as early as May 2015.

‘That is when the records were not kept as efficiently as they could have been,’ said Mr Macgregor.

He believed the ‘proof of the pudding’ in Mr Haywood’s trusted management had been the two million covers completed without incident.