Food poisoning scare angers new owners
A leisure group is fighting to clear its name after there was a food poisoning scare at one of its hotels.
The Walton Park Hotel in Clevedon, near Bristol, hit the headlines in January when it was fined £19,000 for breaching food regulations after 27 diners fell ill from salmonella poisoning.
The problem for owners Latona Leisure is that it bought the hotel from Stonehurst Estates just days after the incident last July, but before the prosecution.
"Since then the local newspaper has branded it the salmonella hotel and the manager is getting paranoid," said Latona managing director Nick Gray. "The mud sticks," he added.
Carol Deacon, editor of the Clevedon Mercury, said: "The circumstances of the change of ownership were unfortunate, but we obviously had to cover the story. We certainly have no axe to grind… we have every confidence in the new owners."
