Day 086 - 09 Feb 95 - Page 49


     
     1        taken are very, very effective.
     2
     3   MR. MORRIS:  Yes, but, surely, Mr. Atherton, the problem is not
     4        how often it happens but what the causes are and whether
     5        there is a risk.  There may be, for all anybody knows,
     6        thousands of other people that contract food poisoning you
     7        do not know about.  That is a fact, is it not, in food
     8        poisoning, generally, most cases do not get reported, do
     9        they?  You would know that as an expert in that area.
    10        A.  I think it is accepted that most cases of food
    11        poisoning, the actual source of it, is not always known.
    12
    13   Q.   Yes, and also most do not get reported, do they?
    14        A.  Not all of them get reported.
    15
    16   Q.   You would not want people to be suffering food poisoning
    17        from McDonald's, would you?
    18        A.  Well, it would not really serve our interests.  We
    19        would not be in business very long if we had a system that
    20        allowed our customers to contract food poisoning.
    21
    22   Q.   So, when there are statutory investigations into major
    23        outbreaks of food poisoning at McDonald's, would you not
    24        expect to see what the statutory authorities have to say
    25        about that so that you can learn from their
    26        recommendations?
    27        A.  I agree.
    28
    29   Q.   Or their criticism?
    30        A.  I agree with you totally, and that would have been the
    31        case if I was in my position when the Preston outbreak
    32        happened.  I was not; I was an Operations Manager in
    33        Anglia.  The people who were in position heard about it,
    34        acted upon it, took the recommendations seriously, altered
    35        our systems in any way.
    36
    37   Q.   So would you have expected to have seen this document then?
    38        A.  I believe Jill Barnes was in position then and the
    39        hierarchy above, her Kevin Haag -- I deal with matters that
    40        are current.
    41
    42   Q.   If the authorities had found both in Preston and in Oregon
    43        that during busy periods certain parts of the grill were
    44        cooler than the temperature standards established by
    45        McDonald's, and thought that was responsible for the
    46        under-cooking of the burgers leading to the food poisoning
    47        outbreak, would that knowledge, if you had seen it or if
    48        you see it now, help to focus your mind on a potential area
    49        of hazard?
    50        A.  I am afraid I am going to have to ask you to ask that 
    51        question again.  You have lost me somewhere along the line. 
    52 
    53   Q.   Helen was asking you earlier about the differences in
    54        temperature in various parts of the grill, if you remember,
    55        back, middle, front; if the authorities were also concerned
    56        about that, would that -----
    57
    58   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Just pause a moment, Mr. Morris.  Is there
    59        any difficulty about the question?  (To the witness):  If
    60        you had been informed of an enquiry or a problem, potential

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