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The one that wiped out burgers, lasagne and canelloni from our supermarket shelves? Well after a six year investigation two French men and two Dutch men were convicted in 2019 and shared
jail time and suspended sentences between them. We didn't escape scot free – two Brits and a Dane were also convicted at the Inner London Crown Court. It was one of the biggest food
adulteration scandals in history and involved about 750 tonnes of horsemeat, millions of binned ready meals, the involvement of two respected French food firms and a tortuous chain of events
taking in Romania, Poland, Belgium, Canada and Holland. Point is, the corrupted meat originated in the EU (and a little bit from Canada where Cheval à la mode is no stranger to restaurant
menus) and it slipped, apparently unknowingly, into Europe's food chain largely in France where it was distributed by two big firms. Three criminals over here clearly played their part
– but with full knowledge of the criminal acts they were committing. The dodgy animal husbandry and failures of systemic checks and balances was really mainland European. So, the idea that
somehow British standards of husbandry suddenly collapsed as Brexit arrived at the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve while the EU's are somehow the global gold standard is as
wrong as it is insulting as it is unlikely. But that is what is being alleged today. The mayors of the French ports of the Channel and the North Sea are calling for the creation of something
called a "European health coordination force" dedicated to quality control of food products imported from Great Britain. Apparently, according to the administrators of the port
cities, EU initiatives are needed to protect imported goods, as there is evidence of a "dumping strategy that the British government seems to want to promote". How they arrived at
this spurious conclusion is a touch unclear and given that most EU imports are currently in a car park in Kent (as gleefully pointed out by one woefully misnamed EU 'diplomat'), it
is difficult to see quite how anything is being dumped anywhere. But let's not let l'actualite get in the way of a good story. "We cannot have doubts about the quality of our
food," the high-minded clique of local, national and EU representatives said. Which, frankly, would carry more weight if, as previously mentioned, France hadn't been at the heart
of the last big pan-European food scandal. They really don't seem to like us do they? You know, our friends across the Channel. And no I don't mean every French person – I mean the
authority figures, the elected and non-elected representatives from mealy-mouthed Macron downwards. It's very dispiriting. I love France: I love it's people and their joie de
vivre, I love Paris (who couldn't?), I love it's wine, its laid back lifestyle, it's Cote d'Azur, its history, its haute couture, its Camus and Sartre, its Monet and
Manet, its love of liberté, égalité, and fraternité, god I even love its football team. But its politicians suck. DON'T MISS BREXIT REVENGE: FRANCE THREATENS UK WITH MORE BORDER CHECKS
ON FOOD [COMMENT] MACRON SAID BREXIT BRITAIN ‘WILL BE AS INSIGNIFICANT AS GUERNSEY' [INSIGHT] BORIS URGED TO PUNISH EU IF FRANCE PLUNDERS UK'S FINANCIAL SERVICES [POLL] I've
concluded they suffer from some sort of collective Stockholm syndrome. I've often felt perplexed that after Britain gave everything to help out a mate across the Channel who was being
bullied by Germans – and she did this twice – the French politicians then went running back into the arms of the people who had been racing Panzers up and down the Champs Elysees for six
years. While the rest of the world was in two minds over whether to allow Germany back into the human race De Gaulle couldn't jump in Das Bett fast enough, while doing everything he
could to trip post war Britain up. Stockholm syndrome. And yes I know that was then and this is now and the world is a very different place and Germany is now genuinely the very model of a
modern progressive nation state – but it's still baffling. It's said that after the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki the survivors did not hate the Americans but loved them.
In some awful Orwellian way the sheer display of untrammelled power broke minds a little bit – maybe this is what happened with France and Germany. Whatever it is, is doesn't half seem
to refuse to go away. Today, after four years of Mr Barnier trying to teach us a lesson, we find yet another raft of faceless French bureaucrats trying to trip up post Brexit Britain. Plus
ca change...