Isle of Man Meats had had to dispose of some of its frozen stock following equipment failure.

It said it had no choice but to dispose of offal and held stock as it was not fit for human consumption.

The problem involved a faulty freezer at the government-owned Meat Plant that was not keeping its contents cold enough.

A spokesperson said: ‘Despite recent servicing of the freezer within the factory, and regular temperature compliance checks in place, this older piece of equipment failed over the week/weekend of July 22.

‘By legislation this stock must be held at minus 12 degrees and below (dependent on type) and due to the freezer failure this rose to minus 5 degrees.

‘Therefore we have had no choice but to dispose of this stock as not fit for human consumption.’

It pointed out that pet food also carries the same requirements by law and so none of the meat could be salvaged.

While Isle of Man Meats focuses on selling out fresh meat, it uses the freezer to prevent wastage from unsold stock that is close to end of its shelf life and to build up stocks of red offal to sell to the pet food industries.

Less than £40,000 of potential sales is held in this way, representing about 0.4% of annual volume.

The spokesperson added: ‘While waste occurs at each point in the chain across the food industry, it is something that we strive to prevent. However, legislation is in place to protect human health and must take priority.’

In April it was revealed that almost two tonnes (1859kg) of meat had been disposed of at the Tromode-based Meat Plant that month as a result of what was described as ‘errors in stock management’.