Day 186 - 10 Nov 95 - Page 31
1 has to be a man, but never mind -- "You had better not go
2 to McDonald's any more. The food can give you cancer and
3 heart disease and that is accepted medical fact and,
4 anyway, McDonald's are a bunch of crooks because they cover
5 this up and pretend to be nutritious".
6
7 He talked about this whole section being in immediate terms
8 and that it was all, well, just about the immediacy of the
9 leaflet. I just wanted to say that, I mean, I have covered
10 this to some extent. Most people in London, which is where
11 distribution is alleged, in terms of on the street, would
12 have come across McDonald's before and know people who eat
13 there from time to time, even if they do not eat there
14 themselves. They would also know that they have not died
15 instantly. Most people are also aware of nutrition
16 information which has been put about by health authorities
17 and frequently been covered in the media.
18
19 I am not saying that they would have necessarily read the
20 information directly from the health authorities, but they
21 are aware of information which initially comes from health
22 authorities which has been covered in the media, not just
23 in broad sheets but in the tabloids too, about diet.
24 Although parts of this have not been consistent, mainly
25 because of input from people with vested interests in the
26 food industry, they know from the information that they
27 have read and, in addition, from their own experiences of
28 their family and friends, that diseases such as cancer and
29 heart diseases are not instantly brought about by a meal
30 they eat, or even by a week or a month of unhealthy eating;
31 that many people are not affected, the majority of people
32 probably, and that where such diseases do occur they take
33 several years to develop and are influenced by other
34 matters, for example, smoking and exercise.
35
36 That is really just to counter this line that Mr. Rampton
37 had about the immediacy of the whole leaflet, that people
38 are not going to think: "Oh, if I eat there I am going to
39 drop dead". This is a kind of implication that the public
40 are completely ignorant in such matters.
41
42 We contend that, as the leaflet states, most people realise
43 that the kind of foods sold by McDonald's is junk food as
44 in not particularly good for you in nutritional terms.
45 They know, and if they are asked they will say, that food
46 from burger bars is unhealthy, and that they would not
47 believe a company who told them it was healthy. In some
48 ways it might be thought that for most people the nutrition
49 section of the leaflet was unnecessary, and that when they
50 read it they thought: "Yes, yes, I know all that", at
51 least in sort of basic terms anyway, "but I eat there
52 because it is cheap and/or convenient and/or I like the
53 taste".
54
55 In case Mr. Rampton gets up and asks: Why then was the
56 subject covered, the answer is that because although people
57 know these things, they often shut them to the back of
58 their minds because it makes life easier, or less
59 complicated for them and also because the leaflet is a look
60 at particularly the fast food industry, in particular,
