Day 120 - 03 May 95 - Page 45


     
     1        you have already managed to mount on the hypothesis I have
     2        put forward that McDonald's is happy with sackings for
     3        union activity.  But I do not know whether you will
     4        establish such a case in the UK.  I will have to wait and
     5        hear what the evidence is.
     6
     7   MS. STEEL:  I should have said the UK company is part of
     8        McDonald's Corporation as well, so the point is, is it all
     9        part of McDonald's?
    10
    11   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It is not just part, it is a wholly-owned
    12        subsidiary, I have been told.
    13
    14   MR. RAMPTON:  Can I come back to where we started from, my Lord.
    15        I have heard nothing.  I have seen nothing on paper whether
    16        in the Defendants witness statements or pleadings, and I
    17        have heard from Mr. Nicholson, which leads me to suppose
    18        that any kind of a franchisee agreement is disclosable.  If
    19        your Lordship urges upon me that I am wrong about that,
    20        then I would need time to think about it and to argue, if I
    21        thought right.
    22
    23   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I would like you to think about it, for this
    24        reason, because a proportion of all McDonald's stores -- by
    25        which I mean those taking advantage of the McDonald's brand
    26        name, and the benefit of various services from the first
    27        plaintiff -- so defined, and perhaps a significant
    28        proportion, are part of what is going on around the world
    29        under the banner of McDonald's (if I can describe it in
    30        that way) and I may have to decide at the end of the day,
    31        in various areas, to what extent the First Plaintiff bears
    32        responsible for that insofar as those practices can be
    33        criticised.  I would have thought, but I do not know, that
    34        there is a very carefully modelled franchise agreement.
    35
    36   MR. RAMPTON:  I am sure there is.
    37
    38   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  In every case I have -- I have to say there
    39        are not very many -- been involved in at the Bar where
    40        there were franchises, and it is remarkable in how many
    41        areas of commercial life the business is not actually run
    42        by the person whose brand name is plastered all over it,
    43        but by an entirely different company, but because the brand
    44        name is so important there are extremely carefully worded
    45        model franchise agreements, which may be adapted from
    46        country to country or contractual relationship to
    47        contractual relationship in relatively minor respects, but
    48        there they are.
    49
    50   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes, I am sure that is right.  If there every came 
    51        a point, I quite agree, where the strict legality of the 
    52        corresponding obligations and responsibility was in 
    53        question, then I can quite see the franchise agreement
    54        would govern that relationship, and might help your
    55        Lordship to determine that particular issue.  But, as far
    56        as I am aware, there is nothing in this case which gives
    57        rise to that question.  In a broader sense, of course, it
    58        is a matter for your Lordship's judgment, and not anything
    59        to do with the franchise agreement, whether McDonald's
    60        ought, even if they do not actually, to accept

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