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Dirty Stourbridge restaurant fined for string of hygiene failings

A Stourbridge restaurant has been fined more than £10,000 after a string of serious hygiene failings – including dirty equipment and storing raw meat with drinks bottles.

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Photos from Isha's show the dirty conditions inside the restaurant

Environmental health officers from Dudley Council took action against Isha's, in Stourbridge Road, Lye, following an inspection of the restaurant in October 2017.

Officers discovered the restaurant was failing to keep walls and floors clean, as well failing to keep equipment including food containers and a microwave clean and in good repair and condition. The restaurant was also found to be storing raw chicken in contact with drinks bottles and failing to implement a food safety management system.

Photos from Isha's show the dirty conditions inside the restaurant

The owners, Rajori Garden Ltd, and the company director, 50-year-old Ram Lal, pleaded guilty to five charged each under food safety and hygiene regulations at Wolverhampton Magistrates Court.

On March 7, the company was fined £10,800 and ordered to pay £1,478 in costs and a victim surcharge of £170. Lal was fined £720 and ordered to pay £1,478 in costs and a £72 victim surcharge.

Councillor Gaye Partridge, Dudley Council's cabinet member for health and wellbeing, said: "This council works with businesses to secure compliance with the law, we will not hesitate to take legal action against the minority of food businesses proprietors who do not take our advice on board and who fail to meet their legal responsibilities.

"People need to know that the vast majority of food businesses in the borough are well run and compliant with hygiene and safety rules.

"More than half of all food outlets in the borough are achieving the top hygiene rating of five, with the vast majority achieving a satisfactory rating of three or more.

"I would urge consumers to check out hygiene ratings online as these will give consumers a glimpse of what is going on in the kitchen when they eat out, or behind the scenes at the places they shop.”

Isha's, in Stourbridge Road, Lye. Photo: Google Maps

A spokesman for Dudley Council confirmed that Isha's had recently been reinspected and is now achieving a broadly compliant hygiene rating of three.

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