Food hygiene ratings in Enfield
What I really love about doing this sort of journalism, is that although sometimes finding the data you need is a slog, sometimes you can just stumble upon a really great dataset you can use and have some fun with.
I found some data on food hygiene ratings in my borough. Not only a chance to check out where I should or shouldn’t go(!) but something that’s really important for the public to know.
Businesses are given a rating from 0-5, where 0 is “urgent improvement necessary” and 5 is “very good”. Basically, you want your business to achieve a rating of 3 or upwards, as 0, 1 and 2, all signify that improvements are necessary.
Looking at the numbers more closely, this means that 20% of all businesses in Enfield have a hygiene rating where improvement is necessary. Doesn’t sound like a lot, but that’s one in five. Taking the exempt ones out of the equation, and the ones awaiting inspection, that figure rises to 25% – a massive one in four. And how many different restaurants have you visited in your area?
One of the first things that struck me was that, because I know Enfield, I noticed lots of roads in the same area had been mentioned. This area, by the way, is one of the poorer areas in the borough. It occurred to me that it would make sense that these businesses which need improvement may well be in a particularly deprived area of Enfield.
Below, I’ve plotted the restaurant ratings in Enfield on top of the average deprivation index (the average between the Income Deprivation Affecting Children Index (IDACI) and the Income Deprivation Affecting Older People Index (IDAOPI) in 2010). Most of the lower-rated businesses (0, 2 and 1) seem to be concentrated in south/east Enfield – in the areas which suffer from the most deprivation.
