New food safety chief will face fight to repair image

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) is seeking a new chairman to repair its image after criticism of the body during the horsemeat scandal earlier this year.

The four-year role commands a £60,000 salary for two to three days a week and will be subject to "pre-appointment scrutiny by a House of Commons Select Committee", according to a newspaper advertisement yesterday.

The current FSA chairman, Jeff Rooker, said in December that he would step down at the end of his four-year contract in July.

MPs attacked the Government and FSA after equine DNA was found in supermarket beef products, saying consumers had been "cynically duped".