Day 032 - 06 Oct 94 - Page 24
1 So, it was with that view that we took Peckham, which is a
2 fairly low income area in South London, South East London,
3 and asked questions of respondents coming out of fastfood
4 stores in that area.
5
6 Q. Can you remember what year this was done?
7 A. It was undertaken in 1987, autumn 1987, the survey.
8 I think this was published in early 1988 and, regrettably,
9 there appears to be no date on the cover sheet.
10
11 Q. I do not know whether you want to take us through the
12 parts that you think are important?
13 A. Well, the obvious; if I can just bring attention to
14 the one major fact that came out of this, which was that
15 our fear that there were high consumption eaters, that is
16 to say, people using fastfood stores at a much greater
17 rate than the average would lead one to believe, was
18 confirmed; we found, amongst those using fastfood stores,
19 that there were, indeed, a fair proportion who are using
20 those types of stores several times a week and, indeed,
21 nearly a third using them virtually every day.
22
23 Q. Are those the figures that are on page 1: "87 per cent of
24 fastfood eaters claim to eat fastfood at least once a week
25 with 31 per cent of fastfood eaters saying they ate
26 fastfood every day"?
27 A. Yes, that is correct. For precision, it was actually
28 30.5, as you will see at the bottom of the table that
29 follows.
30
31 Q. It might be worth just turning to page 11 so we get an
32 idea of the numbers of people surveyed and which
33 particular stores they were questioned at -- sorry, where
34 were people questioned?
35 A. Yes. This survey was undertaken by, as I say, a
36 student and, indeed, a colleague of hers that came to give
37 her some assistance. These were two young women. We did
38 not feel it appropriate to have them standing outside
39 fastfood stores in the evening. So, they basically asked
40 people coming out at lunch time and during the afternoon.
41 By "afternoon" I meant post school coming out time around
42 3.30 to 5.00.
43
44 Q. So people were questioned as they were coming out of
45 school?
46 A. They were questioned as they came out of the stores;
47 the four stores chosen, as you can see from the list, were
48 McDonald's, Wimpy, Kentucky Fried Chicken and a local fish
49 and chip shop. The numbers interviewed are given there;
50 it is just over the hundred for McDonald's in total.
51
52 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Do you think it possible that if you
53 question at lunch time people who are coming out of a
54 fastfood outlet you are likely, more likely, to find a
55 significant proportion who use them a lot and, I can
56 imagine, fall into the habit of going to the same place,
57 wherever it is, for lunch if, for instance, you are coming
58 out of your office, or wherever; whereas if you are just
59 coming out of the cinema you go to once a month at half
60 past ten at night or going in at half past 7 before the
