Day 296 - 07 Nov 96 - Page 09
1
2 Obviously, if he cannot tell the difference between the
3 two, what on earth are they suing over? It is clear from
4 the fact that he criticised their own pamphlet when he
5 mistook it for the London Greenpeace fact sheet is the
6 reason they are suing is just because they do not like
7 groups such as London Greenpeace drawing these problems to
8 the attention of the public. The problem of the link
9 between a high fat, low fibre diet and degenerative
10 diseases, they do not like that being associated with
11 McDonald's.
12
13 Secondly, in terms of showing that the statement in the
14 London Greenpeace fact sheet about the links between diet
15 and ill health is a reasonable statement to make, we have
16 the opinion, or the admission, from Dr. Arnott, the
17 Plaintiffs' own expert witness on cancer, who, when
18 Mr. Morris asked him his opinion of the statement 'a diet
19 high in fat, sugar, animal products and salt and low in
20 fibre, vitamins and minerals is linked with cancer of the
21 breast and bowel and heart disease', he replied: "If it is
22 being directed at the public then I would say it is a very
23 reasonable thing to say". He said: "It has been linked".
24 And then Mr. Morris said: "Would that be a reasonable
25 statement?" He said: "If it was being directed at the
26 public..." then he would say it was a very reasonable thing
27 to say, but that "if it was being directed towards the
28 scientific community, then I think one would be a bit more
29 careful about the language which one is using". This is
30 day 22, page 32.
31
32 I think the point to remember here is that the public are
33 precisely who the fact sheet was aimed at. The fact sheet
34 does not pretend to be some specialist, scientific
35 document. It makes plain throughout that it is a leaflet
36 about the fast food industry and the various ways in which
37 that industry, and multi-nationals in general, harm people,
38 both customers and staff, and animals and the planet that
39 we live on, and nobody is going to mistake it for a
40 scientific journal.
41
42 We say that the admission by the Plaintiffs' own declared
43 expert in the field should have been the end of this
44 matter. He was stating that the London Greenpeace
45 statement about diet and ill health is a satisfactory
46 summary in terms of our present state of knowledge and how
47 to convey that knowledge to the public.
48
49 Obviously, after we get over that hurdle in relation to the
50 links between diet and ill health, we still have to show
51 that McDonald's food has all the attributes of a typical
52 western diet, being high in fat, particularly saturated or
53 animal fat, salt and sugar, and low in fibre, vitamins and
54 minerals.
55
56 We would say that the major part of this, possibly
57 excluding sugar, vitamins and minerals, which I am going to
58 come back to later, was admitted very early on in the trial
59 with the evidence of Paul Preston, the president of
60 McDonald's UK, who admitted that McDonald's products were
