Day 146 - 03 Jul 95 - Page 18
1 pass from the hide skin gut condemned rooms through the
2 clean area in order to get to their changing rooms", in
3 fact, says Mr. Bone, that is not true. They have to go
4 around the outside, but again it is something we could have
5 dealt with if we had had notice of it.
6
7 Then, my Lord, back to the boot wash which Mr. Bone deals
8 with in paragraphs 10 and 11. My Lord, a point I mentioned
9 before -- these are all points, my Lord, where I have put
10 brackets round the question mark after the "N" because,
11 having looked at it again, it is my belief that this is
12 actually really completely new material.
13
14 The wheeling of the bins, my Lord, in paragraph 12, again
15 that is completely absent from the written statement.
16 There were, as one can see there, three or four pages of it
17 in Ms. Hovi's evidence-in-chief. My Lord, Mr. Bone
18 explains the bins over the next three pages and down to the
19 bottom of paragraph 19 on page 10, both the times when the
20 bins are used, the purposes for which they are used, their
21 travel path and their cleaning between use; all things
22 which he would have dealt with, or somebody would have
23 dealt with, if we had had any notice at all that an
24 allegation was being made about the bins or trollies.
25
26 Then, my Lord, paragraph 20: Ms. Hovi alleged that the man
27 concerned with the bleed hoist, whom she mistakenly thought
28 was somebody different from the man who did the stunning,
29 pithing and the sticking -- in fact, they are all the same
30 person -- she said that he did not have access to a hand
31 wash or sterilizer for his equipment.
32
33 All that is said in the written statement is: "Throughout
34 the plant there was a shortage of facilities for the
35 disinfection of hand tools and knives leading to
36 contamination of the carcasses and the meat".
37
38 My Lord, perhaps one can look at it this way: Imagine that
39 one is a Jarrett person, or one is Mr. Bennett, and one
40 looks at what is written in Ms. Hovi's written statement:
41 "Throughout the plant there was a shortage of facilities
42 for the disinfection of hand tools and knives", one sits
43 down and one scratches one's head and one says: "Well,
44 what on earth is she talking about? Unless she is willing
45 to say where the shortage is to be found, who are the
46 personnel who do not have access to these necessary
47 facilities, one cannot possibly deal with it
48 comprehensively. So, it is, of course, that when she came
49 into the box and began to give us details of what she meant
50 by this that we are now able to answer or would be able to
51 answer them if we called Mr. Bone.
52
53 A point of identical nature on page 11 in paragraph 21,
54 "Inadequate washing of hands", says Ms. Hovi, and, second,
55 she says, same day, same page, that there was no
56 sterilization of the pithing rod. There is no mention in
57 her written statement of a pithing rod at all. There is no
58 mention of the allegation that it was not sterilized. In
59 fact, as your Lordship sees from Mr. Bone's statement, if
60 he is right, it actually rests in a sterilizing unit.
