'Try something new' - or not

Doctoring the shelf life of produce, chasing rodents and employees trimming their nails with food scissors - can you believe it?

Er....well...Anyone surprised, phased at all? What can we, the customer, really do to change the working practises of Tescos, Sainsbury's and the like? Well, maybe something, if any of us who succumb to the convenience of the supermarkets have the inclination, which we really don't.

I'm as guilty as the rest and know from first hand experience the state of these places behind the scenes. When I worked part-time on the check-out in a busy supermarket we had both local and tropical wildlife running around amidst the goods. Birds would swoop in and out of the store room, crapping everywhere, rats were not uncommon. Neither was the occassional wolf spider in your grapes. Yum.

The grocery giants must be heaving sighs of relief that those scamps at the Beeb only infiltrated two stores...God knows what horrors they would have found nationwide.

One can only pity the two journo's who had to spend four months of their lives alongside the "hard working", "committed" supermarket staff - the usual assortment of disgruntled students, chavs and jobsworths - shaving, mincing and re-selling meat (with your section manager's favourite manicure instrument....).