FOOD hygiene visits in East Ayrshire will resume in little more than a month’s time, council bosses have announced.

Environmental health officials had to put their in-person regime on hold because of Covid, but East Ayrshire Council says visits to premises will resume on Thursday, September 1.

The council’s website shows that many premises in the area are ‘Awaiting Inspection’ as part of the Food Hygiene Information Scheme – with some having been due a visit in 2020.

During the pandemic, Scottish Ministers allowed local authorities to deviate from the Code of Practice in certain defined circumstances.

The authority says the “highest risk” businesses will take priority when inspections resume.

East Ayrshire Council have since confrimed they will begin undertaking these visits once again from September, with the most at-risk businesses taking priority.

Elaine Cavanagh, Regulatory Services Manager, East Ayrshire Council said: “A date of 1 September 2021 was set for local authorities to have programmed and resumed their entire intervention programme for the next five years. This is known as our recovery plan.

“We’ll be visiting businesses which present the highest risk due to their activities and compliance scores earlier in the programme, with lower risk, highly complaint businesses towards the end.

“ Most businesses have had remote partial interventions during the pandemic.”