Cleanliness is next to ... food?

I was sitting on the tube yesterday vaguely looking at an issue of "The Metro" when I saw an article that got my interest. The headline was about some restaurant fined for sanitation violations, and I saw the word "Ealing Broadway". Upon closer inspection I read that a local restaurant, Chinese / Thai place, was being fined for a number of sanitation violations, apparently having a rat and pigeon infestation. I have eaten at the place a couple of times, but it wasn't a restaurant that I liked so I wasn't feeling too queazy still it occured to me that there was a bigger issue. How would I, as someone that eats out every meal, know if a restaurant I was eating at had a record of bad sanitation? The answer isn't readily apparent. On the one hand some restaurants I've been to have some kind of certificate up on the wall saying that they passed some audit, but most don't do that. On the other hand forcing a restaurant that had failed a sanitation check to put up a notice to that effect would probably hurt the business significantly (rightly so in my opinion) and wouldn't be enforced. I guess there must be some kind of government website around that allows you to look up information on restaurants, but it will make me think before I wander into the next restaurant, well for a second or two at any rate :)