THE WOODFORD Green branch of Tesco has been accused of putting the lives of its customers at risk by selling out of date meat and fish.

Staff at the store, in Southend Road, were pictured falsifying use-by date labels on produce during a recent undercover investigation, raising fears over food safety.

Two journalists used false references to gain employment at the supermarket in November 2006, before filming several worrying examples of staff negligence, which were screened during BBC1 programme, Whistleblower, on Tuesday night.

BBC reporter, Audrey Brown, who worked on the store's fish counter for five months, said she was sickened' by the incidents she witnessed, including shellfish being refrozen, and fridge temperature readings being falsified by staff.

She said: "At Tesco, we saw the use-by date on a batch of lamb illegally extended by six days, staff reusing bin liner covers to cover raw meat, and an employee cutting her nails using food scissors.

"One day I noticed the mincer on the meat counter was smelling bad and it seemed that a fault in the mechanism was heating up the mince.

"I removed several pieces of meat that were cooked but instead of throwing it away, the raw and partly cooked meat was simply mixed together and put back onto the counter."

Ms Brown claims many of the incidents, which included a staff member using a knife sharpener to prise open a drain cover, were the result of poor training and pressure from managers to cut costs.

She said: "Even as a counter assistant, the pressure staff seemed to feel was almost tangible.

"This appeared to lead some at Tesco to run real risks with customers' health, with some use-by dates being changed or ignored."

Store manager, Mark Hudson, who was not in charge of the branch at the time of the investigation, said all staff at the supermarket are fully trained and are constantly monitored to ensure standards are maintained.

He said: "We ensure that all of our new staff are trained to a high level in food hygiene and we will take appropriate action if we see evidence that these rules have been deliberately broken.

"We employ more than 250 local people at this store and really care about the community we serve, so we take these allegations incredibly seriously."

A spokesman from Tesco head office said: "What has not been shown is the hours of footage where our staff were doing the right thing, including training the undercover reporters in food hygiene and preparation.

"This is the reality and our customers can be reassured that our stores, products and suppliers are safe."

Following the worrying scenes of poor food hygiene standards caught on camera by the BBC at Tesco in Woodford Green, the Guardian decided to visit the store to give manager, Mark Hudson, the chance to give a response to these allegations: Member of staff pictured changing sell-by dates to extend the shelf life of a packet of prawns by three days: "This is not company policy and we are disappointed to have seen this, but there was no threat to customer health because the sell-by date is set well before the product becomes unhealthy to eat."

Several members of staff pictured falsifying the temperature check records of fridges containing raw fish and meat: "All staff on that counter are fully trained to fill in the temperature records properly and we are disappointed that they have taken it upon themselves, for whatever reason, not to do so."

Department manager telling staff to re-use bins liners to cover raw meat in order to save money.': "This is clearly the wrong thing to do and is not encouraged by the company. This particular person has now left."

Member of staff pictured mixing partially cooked minced meat with raw meat and placing this back on the counter for sale: "Staff are made well aware of the dangers of cross contamination, and we have since taken steps to reinforce this message.

"I would like to reassure customers that we have now replaced the machine involved."

Member of staff seen using a fish knife to open the cover of a blocked drain: "This was a complete misrepresentation by the programme, because the knife in question is an old one which is only used for opening the drain cover, not for cutting fish with."

Member of staff filmed sniffing fish to judge whether it was past its use-by date: "Again, this goes completely against company policy, and the staff member involved was experienced enough to know she should have been checking the product's use-by date instead."

Same member of staff recorded speaking about an incident in which she kicked a cooked chicken along the floor before selling it to a customer: "We need to ascertain whether or not this is true, but if it is then it is a very serious offence and we would take appropriate action against that particular person."

Member of staff pictured walking from the cooked chicken counter to the raw meat counter without washing her hands or changing her apron: "As I said before, staff are fully trained and warned about the dangers of cross contamination, so this action was completely unacceptable."

Member of staff shown cutting her finger nails with a pair of fish counter scissors: "I was very disappointed to see this, as it is unhygienic and that member of staff was well aware of this."

Mr Hudson said that all of the incidents shown during the programme would be fully investigated, and that appropriate action would be taken against those staff members found to have breached company food hygiene regulations.