This is DISGUSTING!!
I am so glad we don't rely on commercially farmed eggs but this has been happening over a 5 year period at least so we could have unknowingly bought some in the past which is disturbing as we bought Free Range so as not to subject hens to a battery farm existence. It makes my blood boil.
A scam involving eggs laid by battery hens in Europe being sold as free-range or organic in UK supermarkets is 10 times bigger than previously feared.
Consumers may have been duped into paying higher prices for more than 500 million mislabelled eggs over five years.
Investigators from the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) are continuing their investigation into the scale of egg fraud in Britain.
In a fresh twist, they released CCTV images on Monday of a man they suspect may be a UK broker in the international swindle. The man, aged in his 50s or 60s, is pictured attempting to access a postal safety deposit box in Kensington, west London.
The box was rented in the name of Heinz Bernstein, who gave an address in Herford, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, but officers believe both are false.
A Defra spokesman said investigators do not believe mislabelled eggs are still being traded.
He said: "Whilst it would appear from the inquiries that this particular aspect of the alleged fraud has ceased, our investigation team are very keen to identify this individual and establish his innocence or otherwise in connection with this particular line of inquiry.
"It is important to note that this is an alleged fraud against the public and the rest of the British egg industry and it is important we get to the bottom of this."
An investigation into the mislabelling of eggs was launched last November. More than two million imported battery eggs may have been misleadingly labelled and sold as free-range or organic every week over five years in the UK.
Enforcement officers are trying to unravel a complex supply network to find out who masterminded the operation.
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