Day 101 - 10 Mar 95 - Page 60
1
2 Q. A company welfare statement or something?
3 A. Yes, exactly that.
4
5 Q. You think that you got that from him after that?
6 A. Yes, I am sure there was another letter following this
7 one.
8
9 Q. What about Bowes? Did you write to Bowes?
10 A. No, I think I -- it was only Roach that I spoke to. I
11 think somebody else spoke to the other -- if you look at
12 the -- I would assume all these replies are the same thing
13 -- I think Barbara was involved in talking to the others.
14
15 Q. These are all about slaughter, the individual -----
16 A. Well, there would have been communication with our
17 primary suppliers. I do not think there would have
18 necessarily been communication with suppliers further down
19 the chain.
20
21 Q. So you did not already have all this information on file --
22 you did not have this information -----
23
24 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I was going to ask, what is the point of just
25 asking for a statement? What does that achieve for you?
26 A. I think -----
27
28 Q. I mean, is it window dressing or does it achieve something
29 more?
30 A. Well, I think the reason for doing it was that we were
31 actually going into print on stating that this is
32 McDonald's suppliers' official position on animal welfare
33 and, as a matter of diligence, we felt that we should have
34 that in writing. We know what the positions are and there
35 is a lot of verbal communication and, in fact, in the past
36 the majority of discussions about welfare have all been
37 verbal, but we felt that since we were going into print
38 that perhaps we should have this on file.
39
40 MS. STEEL: You asked Mr. Pawson for the company's statement on
41 welfare at slaughter, and that is what he sent you?
42 A. This, I am trying to remember back, I think he sent me
43 this and then I had to speak to him again and say: "This
44 is not quite what I was asking for".
45
46 Q. He obviously did not have a statement, did he, otherwise he
47 would have stuck one in the post to you straightaway and
48 immediately realised what you were talking about?
49 A. I think if you look at the bottom of the page it says
50 this was dictated by Mr. Pawson and signed in his absence.
51 He was obviously keen to reply to my questions as quickly
52 as possible. It looks like he phoned his secretary,
53 dictated a letter. It was not exactly what I wanted, so he
54 had to send a different letter.
55
56 Q. If the company had a statement, surely, he would have said
57 to his secretary: "Can you just stick a copy of our
58 statement in the post to Mr. Kenny"?
59 A. Like I say, I think there was obviously some sort of
60 miscommunication. I could well have been talking to him
