Day 130 - 26 May 95 - Page 16


     
     1
     2   MR. MORRIS:  So he was not just an inexperienced crew person?
     3        A.  He certainly was not inexperienced, no.   As I was
     4        saying in my evidence earlier, what we find is it is the
     5        very new people that just tend to make mistakes because
     6        they have so much to think about, and suffer minor
     7        accidents, and it is the people who have been with the
     8        Company quite a long time that are also the ones that have
     9        quite a few accidents.
    10
    11   Q.   Going on to your report -----
    12
    13   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Can I make a suggestion about this?  By all
    14        means, ask Mrs. Barnes about matters where you think there
    15        may be more information useful to you, like:  What were the
    16        further faults?  But what you do not have to do, where she
    17        says something which you think amounts to criticism of
    18        McDonald's, you do not have to ask her to verify it,
    19        because I am going to take that to be her report.  If
    20        Mr. Rampton had wanted to avoid any criticism laid down,
    21        I assume he would have asked questions about it, to take
    22        the sting out of it.
    23
    24        You are not to take that as an indication I have made up my
    25        mind, one way or the other, as to who is to be criticised
    26        and how seriously, but you do not have to underline it by
    27        asking about it.  You may find that you get "a confession
    28        and avoidance", as lawyers call it, if you do.  So
    29        I suggest you rest on the report where you think it has got
    30        what you need.
    31
    32   MR. MORRIS:  A lot of it has been dealt with already.
    33
    34   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes, it has.
    35
    36   MR. MORRIS (To the witness):  Just skipping through it really,
    37        page 4, the Harbourne incident -- there was another memo
    38        about that somewhere.  Where is Harbourne, by the way?
    39        A.  It is in Birmingham.
    40
    41   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  We have Harbourne, if you go back to P -- at
    42        least in my P, there is also in my P a copy of your report
    43        as well.  That may be wrong.
    44
    45   MR. MORRIS:  Also, it is, effectively, page 13 of this report
    46        which I presume is -- it says appendix 3 but it is right
    47        after page 12.
    48
    49   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It was the one I was looking at elsewhere,
    50        yes. 
    51 
    52   MR. MORRIS:  This was an accident where the Company had 
    53        identified their view that the cause was rewiring of the
    54        plug and an electrical shock, yes?
    55        A.  Yes.
    56
    57   Q.   And that was some months before the Hopkins incident.  The
    58        back sink at the Arndale store was made of stainless
    59        steel.  Is that the same throughout all the stores in the
    60        country?

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