Day 302 - 18 Nov 96 - Page 29
1 Then it says, for the time record sheet, we have seen a few
2 time record sheets and I don't think they are filled in
3 comprehensively, 'it is a legal requirement', it says, 'to
4 record the following information on the schedule sheets',
5 and it identifies what should be filled in. One of the
6 things is that when an employee's actual hours worked
7 differs by more than 15 minutes in total on a shift on
8 those schedules it must be put on the time record sheet
9 that the person worked, you know, different hours to that
10 which they are scheduled. That to me is a recognition that
11 it is an unfair and poor work practice that people should
12 be expected to work a certain number of hours and actually
13 work a different number of hours. That really happens at
14 McDonald's quite regularly. It says -- no, (Pause) I will
15 not go into more of that. I am not sure what reference
16 that manual is, but it is useful. Pages 20 and 21 of that
17 manual. I think it is bundle pages 27 and 28, but I am not
18 sure.
19
20 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Right.
21
22 MR. MORRIS: Might that be a good time?
23
24 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes, two o'clock.
25
26 (Luncheon Adjournment)
27
28 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Apparently something has happened with
29 Mrs. Brinley-Codd's screen. I will ask Mr. Green to see if
30 she really needs it. If she can do without it, we will
31 stop the engineer coming to avoid the interruption. Yes.
32
33 MR. MORRIS: I think Mr Atkinson has one as well.
34
35 Right. I think the next point we are going to go on to,
36 just a brief mention of health and safety. Starting off
37 with the electrocution on October 12th 1992 of Mark
38 Hopkins, floor manager in Manchester. Just prior to that,
39 McDonald's memo from northwest region, dated 17/2/1992,
40 I think it was. I think it was a different date to that,
41 actually. (Pause) To save looking, it was the memo, I am
42 sure the date has been noted somewhere, that said "There
43 have been several recent incidents in our restaurants where
44 members of staff have received severe shocks from faulty
45 items of electrical equipment."
46
47 It seems this was a general problem and known to be a
48 general problem in northwest region. And, obviously, Mr.
49 Hopkins died of electrocution and we say the evidence shows
50 that the company, whilst doing its own confidential
51 investigation, which was never released, scapegoated a
52 friend of Mr. Hopkins as the person responsible for the
53 accident. But I am not going to go into the details. It
54 is quite clear to us that the company was responsible in
55 any number of ways, and their own confidential
56 investigation -- I have not got the actual quote in front
57 of me - oh, yes, had catalogued a number of company
58 failures and problems and had made the damning conclusion
59 "safety is not seen as being important at store level".
60
