Pictures have revealed the “disgustingly dirty” state of lorries distributing food to 150 supermarkets across the south east.

A former Morrisons lorry driver shared the images, which were taken at the distribution site based in Sittingbourne’s Eurolink industrial estate.

They show pieces of ham unwrapped on the floor, spilt yoghurts and other packages left to rot.

A spokesman for the supermarket confirmed the lorries did not meet its usual standards and would be investigated internally.

The depot serves around 150 Morrisons across the south east, including all of the stores in Kent, some in London, as well as those on the Isle of Wight.

Andrew Frost, who lives in Sittingbourne, had worked for the retail giant for around seven years at three separate times, but quit to become a full-time driving instructor last Friday (October 17).

Now that he has left the firm, the 61-year-old says he wants people to know what conditions the food they buy at Morrisons stores travels in.

He claims that trailers taking food to stores across the county would go “months” without being cleaned properly.

The dad-of-one says dropped food items would become “congealed sludge” over time due to a lack of cleaning equipment and processes at the depot.

He told of one incident where he discovered a wrapper with a sell-by date from six months earlier.

During his time, Andrew says he complained to managers who “shrugged their shoulders”.

He said: “There's no [cleaning] process. The trailers are filthy; there's food that has spilt over, and it's been pushed into a congealed pack at the end of the trailer.

“Every trailer is disgustingly dirty, and they would not be cleaned for months.

“I remember raking away at the black sludge after a shift and picking up a pork pie wrapper with the sell-by date being about six months ago.

“Drivers don't see an empty trailer until the end of the day, as we're not covered by insurance to go onto the back of the it to unload.

“At the end of the shift, we had to take what we call salvage back to the site. It might be the empty cages, the cardboard, the empty pallets.

"The drivers are meant to supervise that process to make sure it's safely unloaded. That's when you see the state of them.

“Many times I've taken pictures, photographs, gone to the transport office and the shoulders are shrugged. [They say] ‘we've got no equipment to do it’.

“It's not their job, but that's the only part of the company that we deal with.

“I've raised it with Swale council before, but nothing was done.

Mr Frost says he hopes that things will change now that he has brought the issue to light.

“[I hope] some sort of process is put in,” he added, “They had equipment which was what you'd clean a garden with.

“I've worked for other distribution places, major supermarkets, and they've got a perfect system for cleaning trailers. So I know how it's meant to be done.

“But Morrisons dosen't do what it needs to do.”

Meanwhile, ex-driver Steve, who did not want his second name to be published, said how the smell of the trailers would "make him heave”.

The 53-year-old, who lives in Rochester, has not been with the company for three years after being involved in a motorbike accident.

He said the problem started soon after he joined in 2019 when Morrisons stopped cleaning the trailers themselves.

“They were in a bad state,” he told KentOnline, "there was no real washing system.

“I was sent to the Isle of Wight, and the whole bottom of the trailer would be full of mouldy food.

“There would be yoghurts, bits of ham and bits of fruit all mixed in.

“Months and months worth of this stuff would build up at the back of the trailers as the new cages would squish it all in.

“The smell of it would make me heave. I would tell the managers, but it was always treated as a joke and not taken seriously.

“I worked for Tesco and they had jet washers which would clean the trailers, but Morrisons didn't have them.”

Swale council declined to comment on whether it was investigating the depot. It said the information would only be accessible through a Freedom of Information request.

It did confirm that distribution centres are subject to the Food Standards Agency Food Law Code of Practice.

A spokesman for Morrisons said: "We take the hygiene of our trailers very seriously.

When trailers are returned to site, they're are swept and cleaned to remove any rubbish or food which may have fallen from a pallet or cage during transit.

“We can see here this does not meet our usual standards and we are investigating this internally."