Metal object found in Morrisons Frozen Swede

congregatio

Hi,
I wonder if you can help. My wife was unfortunate enough to find a sliver of metal in her dinner yesterday. The metal was in Morrison's Diced Swede and my wife actually found the metal in her mouth after taking a bite. We had mashed the swede so the metal was within the mashed swed.


Luckily there was no serious damage but this could quite easily have been one of my children, who were also eating the same meal.

The metal object is rusty, about 1 cm wide by 1.5cm tall, u-shaped and as thin as a razor blade. If swallowed the object would have done some serious damage.

I tried to contact Morrison'simmidiately yesterday (Sunday) but their customer support line only operates on normal business hours.

I have contacted Morrison's head office this morning so that they can have the product removed from their shelves. They requested the metal object and food back to allow internal investigations.

After taking advice I was told not to return the object to Morrison's as they would simply deny that the object was found in their food and that I should contact the local paper who would ensure that the food recall / investigation does happen. I have done this (contacted Stockport express), I have also contacted the food standards agency who put me in touch with the local environmental health officer - (can be found here if someone needs help - sorry had to remove link because of forum rules). I am know waiting for the Health Officer to call me back.


My main concern is that another family has the same experience or worse on the run up to Christmas. I appreciate that it is difficult to prevent foreign objects entering the food chain but this is quite a nasty piece of metal which could have caused a death, especially if it had become trapped in a child's throat.

When speaking to Morrisons head office they treated my concerns as though it was nothing to worry about and seemed dismissive. I dont know whether they recieve these types of complaint from people trying it on but they need to take this seriously. It really is a nasty piece of metal and if there is more present in their frozen swede it could have very serious implcations.


I have received the following reference number from Morrison's - and have been told that I will get a call back about the incident.


The food the metal was found in was Morrison's frozen diced Swede with the sell by date of 08 Mar 2012, with ref FLA 139, bar code 5010251124313.

I would be grateful for any advice you can provide, I don't feel this is being taken seriously by Morrisons and I would be distraught if I discovered that a child or adult had choked on a similar piece of metal. It has obviously rusted of machinery and this indicates that there are likely to be more fragments.

Having contacted Morrisons, the local newspaper and the environmatal health, is there anyone else I should contact? I will post regular updates as I recieve information and hope this helps anyone lese who has a similar concern or problem with anything odd in their food.

--
Edited, I tried to add some photogrpahs but its a bit complicated to do this here.

Dave101t

if its the size you stated, wouldnt you of seen/felt it when mashing the swede?
not to detract from the seriousness of this but mistakes happen, its obviously a one-off (i buy my veg from morrisons) and theres not much more a company can do to ensure fresh veg is clean and free from contaminants than is already being done.
frankly, uk veg is amazingly good, try visiting local markets abroad, its disgusting.

pimento

Frozen swede?

Why?

spadoosh

Im aware large companies make mistakes producing goods and it could have been alot worse for your family if the item was swallowed however have you looked at all the possibilities. ie it could very well have come off one of your utensils (masher, pan). By your description it sounds like a large piece of metal to find in suede and probably shouldve been noticed during cooking/mashing?! Food companies have many stringent fail safes in place to avoid situations like this the most obvious being a metal detector the food is passed through before processing. Just suggesting it could be worth a check on your utensils to see if it is possible the item came off them. Just to save a little embarassment. if your sure it was already in there, bring the house down on them it was extremely dangerous. Good luck

congregatio

Thanks for the quick responses.

The metal was rusty, both the pan and masher are stainless steel, this is the firsat thing I checked.

Hopefully the images will show this time. As you can see the metal is as wide as a razor blade and a little smaller than a 5 pence piece.!!

stupid site wont let me put the images up.
It is of course 'easy to chalk up to experience' but what happens if a 2 year old gets another piece? This is about taking reposability and acting accordingly.

oldagetraveller

" Metal object found in Morrisons Frozen Swede "

Just consider yourself lucky it wasn't a frozen Norwegian!

congregatio

Very Funny, but not particularly helpful

spadoosh

congregatio wrote: »

Thanks for the quick responses.

The metal was rusty, both the pan and masher are stainless steel, this is the firsat thing I checked.

Hopefully the images will show this time. As you can see the metal is as wide as a razor blade and a little smaller than a 5 pence piece.!!

stupid site wont let me put the images up.
It is of course 'easy to chalk up to experience' but what happens if a 2 year old gets another piece? This is about taking reposability and acting accordingly.

Its to prevent spam, quite good really.

Keep doing what youre doing it sounds like your not going to let them get away with it. Dont know all the ins and outs of these procedures but going to the press surely will only help you. Good luck!

congregatio

I appreciate its the spam rule, just a little frustrating as the photos will provide understanding of why I am so concerned.

I have contacted Morrison’s again and offered them copies of the photographs (the Food Standards Agency advised me NOT to pass the food or metal fragment back to Morrison’s). I have also advised them of this thread and invited them to respond (although don’t expect it).

I realise this is an extraordinary event but would have assumed that there would be measures in place to deal with contaminated food. Morrison’s original suggestion of me dropping it into the store or posting to head office would indicate an investigation of several weeks. What happens in the interim?

Surely there should be some form of process in place for this eventuality. I think we have to except that occasionally odd things will turn up in our food, I have no issue with this, my concern is the response or specifically lack thereof.

pinkshoes

I think going to the papers straight away was rather OTT and makes you come across as the ambulance chaser type. By all means contact the FSA, but you really should be giving Morrisons a chance to sort it out before running to the press, sending them good clear images of the object found so that they can try and locate where it's come from and make sure it hasn't got into anyone elses food.

Freddie_Snowbits

spadoosh wrote: »

Keep doing what youre doing it sounds like your not going to let them get away with it. Dont know all the ins and outs of these procedures but going to the press surely will only help you. Good luck!

Quick darling, the media are here to take our photo. Make sure you can cry on tap, and get the orange juice flowing, we are going to be famous, just like Andy said so!