Who was Owen Carey?
Owen Carey was 18 years old. He had a serious milk allergy — the kind he'd managed carefully his whole life. In 2017, he went to Byron Burger to celebrate his birthday. He asked a member of staff about allergens before he ordered. He was told the dish he chose was safe.
It wasn't. The marinade contained buttermilk. Owen went into anaphylactic shock and died.
Nothing about that day required negligence or malice. The staff member likely didn't know. The information wasn't written down anywhere the customer could check. There was no requirement for it to be. That's the gap Owen's Law is designed to close.
What does Owen's Law actually say?
Right now, the Food Information Regulations 2014 require that you have allergen information available for loose food sold in your restaurant — but you can give it verbally. A customer asks, a staff member answers. That's legal.
Owen's Law changes that. It would require written allergen information on the menu itself for every dish — not stored in a folder, not available on request, not something a customer has to know to ask for. Written. On the menu. Every time.
"Verbal information relies on the right person being asked the right question. Written information is there whether or not anyone thinks to ask."
Hasn't this already happened with Natasha's Law?
Sort of — but they cover different things. Natasha's Law (2021) applies to food that's pre-packed for direct sale: sandwiches, wraps and salads made on-site and sold in the same location. Full ingredient labelling, all allergens highlighted.
Owen's Law targets eat-in and takeaway menus. The food you cook to order. The thing a customer reads before they decide what to eat. These are two separate regulations, closing two separate gaps.
When does it come in?
The FSA's 2025 guidance already recommends that every menu carries written allergen information, with staff actively prompting customers about allergies before they order. This isn't Owen's Law — it's the FSA telling you the direction of travel before the legislation catches up.
Owen's Law isn't on the statute books yet — it's a campaign the FSA publicly backs, and an FSA evaluation due in 2026 will advise ministers on whether to make written allergen menus a legal requirement. The timeline may shift, but the direction hasn't: written allergen information is where this is heading. The earlier you get there, the less disruptive it is when it lands.
What the FSA already expects
- Written allergen information for every dish on your menu
- Staff trained to prompt customers about allergies before ordering
- A process for handling allergy queries — not improvised, documented
- Ingredient information that stays current when recipes change
What this actually looks like in practice
For most independent restaurants, the concern isn't the intention — it's the maintenance. You put together an allergen matrix when you opened, or when you last had an inspection. Then you changed your aioli recipe, brought in a different brand of pasta, swapped a supplier. The matrix is still there. It's just wrong now.
A static document is only as useful as the last time someone updated it. The risk isn't a restaurant that has no allergen information. It's a restaurant that has allergen information that isn't accurate — and doesn't know it.
That's the problem Owen's Law forces you to solve properly.
Where HospoPilot fits in
Every recipe you add to HospoPilot carries its full ingredient breakdown. Change an ingredient — swap a product, adjust a quantity — and the allergen matrix updates automatically. It's live, not a snapshot.
Your public menu page, accessible via QR code at the table, already shows allergen badges for every dish. If a customer has a nut allergy, they can see which dishes are safe without having to wait for a staff member who might not know. That's you ahead of where Owen's Law is heading — written allergen info, live and on the menu, today.
When the law passes, restaurants already running HospoPilot won't need to do anything differently. The work is already done.
Your allergen matrix stays current
Add a recipe, list its ingredients, mark the allergens. Change anything — the matrix updates immediately. No spreadsheet to remember to update.
Customers can check before they order
Your HospoPilot menu page shows allergen badges on every dish, accessible by QR code. Written, visible, always up to date.
Staff have something to point to
When a customer asks, your team aren't guessing. The answer is on the screen in front of both of them.
You don't need to wait for the legislation
The FSA guidance is already clear on where this is heading. Allergen information on your menu, staff trained to ask customers about allergies, records that hold up if something goes wrong. Independent restaurants that get ahead of this won't feel the disruption when Owen's Law finally passes — they'll already be there.
And beyond the law, there's a simpler reason to do this: the people eating in your restaurant deserve to know what's in their food. Owen Carey deserved to know. That's why his family has campaigned so hard to make it a legal requirement — because they know firsthand what happens when the system relies on people asking the right question at the right moment.
Further reading: FSA allergen guidance for food businesses · Owen's Law campaign
Last reviewed June 2026 · HospoPilot editorial