Meat firm stored banned mutton

VETS have discovered 57 tonnes of banned British mutton in the freezers of meat products firm Spanghero – and raised fears of a new BSE scare just weeks after the horse-meat scandal.

The mutton is banned because it is mechanically separated meat which can contain fragments of bone and bone marrow. It was banned for sheep, cattle and goats because of the risk of “prion” protein contamination – the cause of mad cow disease in cattle and scrapie in sheep.

Vets found the mutton at the Spanghero warehouses in Castelnaudary and confirmed the result of tests to prosecutors at Carcassonne and the public health department in Paris.

It is not yet known if any of the meat has been used in products sold to the public.

A fraud investigation will be started as the meat is said to have come from the same Dutch supplier as supplied Spanghero with 750 tonnes of horse meat.

Spanghero boss Barthélémy Aguerre told RTL this morning “once again we have been deceived by a supplier”. The company has launched a court action in Paris saying it had been defrauded.