The public inquiry into the 2005 E. coli outbreak in Wales began yesterday and already the evidence is shocking — or, maybe, all too common.

Professor Chris Griffith, head of the food research and consultancy unit at the University of Wales Institute, Cardiff, was asked by South Wales Police to compile a report assessing the health risk posed by John Tudor and Son butchers.

Media Wales is reporting that,

E. coli butcher William Tudor encouraged staff suffering from stomach bugs and diarrhoea to continue preparing meat for school dinners.

He was also aware of cross contamination between raw and cooked meats, but did nothing to prevent it.

Some 150 schoolchildren were sickened in the outbreak and five-year-old Mason Jones died in October 2005.

Prof Griffith was quoted as telling the inquiry,

"Packaging in which raw meat had been delivered was subsequently used to store cooked product," and that a cleaning schedule at the factory was so bad it was "a joke."

Yesterday the inquiry was told that a routine inspection of John Tudor and Son in January 2005, by Bridgend Council environmental health officer Angela Coles, found that one vacuum-packing machine – referred to in the inquiry as a vac-packing machine – was being used to package raw and cooked meats – a potentially serious source of cross-contamination, and that there were no facilities for small equipment – such as knives – to be cleaned.