The probe into the 21 E-coli food poisoning deaths heard yesterday of more blunders by food authority watchdogs.

In trying to stop the spread of suspect cooked meats from butcher's John M Barr & Son a senior official did not tell his boss that a wholesaler's was on the first crucial list of the Barr outlets.

And no-one acted to alert wholesaler Devine Quality Meats in Motherwell or anyone else on the list until the next morning.

North Lanarkshire Council's head of protective services, Mr Graham Bryceland, alleged that his principal environmental health officer, Mr Jeff Tonner failed to tell him that the name ''John Devine'' was on the list.

The list of 14 outlets was the first inkling that the Wishaw shop was a substantial cooked meat product supplier, and not merely a large butcher's selling over-the-counter and to ''some caterers'' as Mr Barr is alleged to have told investigators.

Mr Bryceland told the Motherwell fatal accident inquiry that an officer was sent to the Barr shop on Saturday afternoon, November 23, to obtain a list of outlets.

He said that at a vital first meeting with Mr Barr the previous night, the butcher said that apart from over-the-counter sales only ''local caterers'' were supplied with cooked meats. Cooked meats were then suspected of causing the E-coli 0157 epidemic.

The inquiry has heard that Mrs Elaine Barr sifted through invoices and handed a list to Environmental Health Officer Douglas Calder.

Mr Colin Sutherland, QC for North Lanarkshire, asked what Mr Bryceland expected officers to do with the list. Mr Bryceland said: ''I expected they would look at the list and decide on the basis of that list if there was any imminent risk to public health and contact those places.''

Mr Bryceland added that at 5pm that Saturday Mr Tonner phoned him. ''Mr Tonner advised me it was mainly local shops and did not appear to be caterers,'' he said.

Mr Tonner did not tell him that on the list was John Devine, a Motherwell wholesaler. He spotted the name when he read the list the next day, he said.

The decision not to contact any of the 14 outlets mentioned was not his, said Mr Bryceland. He said the decision was made by other EHOs. ''They were small shops. It was Saturday night and they didn't think the shops would be open.''

He said it would have been difficult on Saturday evening to advise those on the list or anyone who had bought cooked meats from them because the outbreak control team was still investigating milk supplies from local supermarkets as a possible source of E-coli poisoning.

However, a few minutes earlier, Mr Bryceland told the inquiry that the outbreak control team combating the epidemic had decided on Saturday afternoon to warn people not to eat any of Barr cooked meat or cooked meat products they had bought.

Officers were dispatched on Sunday morning to contact Devine Quality Meats, shops, restaurants, and the sole caterer on the list.

Cross-examined by solicitor Paul Santoni - for relatives of victim Alexander Gardiner - Mr Bryceland was shown a risk assessment inspection carried out on the Barr premises 10 months before the outbreak. It made no mention of cross contamination risks. Mr Bryceland agreed that there was ''merit'' in a more experienced, specialist or senior officer carrying out such an inspection.

During the outbreak, 40 different points of cross contamination were found in the Barr operation.

The inquiry continues.