Day 296 - 07 Nov 96 - Page 20


     
     1        of soil as part of a balanced diet and that would contain
     2        nutrients but it would not mean it was a particularly good
     3        idea, although it might actually be more nutritious than
     4        McDonald's food.
     5
     6        Dr. Lobstein said that rather than using the word
     7        'balance', the general view of health professionals was
     8        that there should be greater consumption of healthy foods
     9        and, in his view, McDonald's tend to take the basic food
    10        ingredients and add fat, salt and sugar, encouraging their
    11        customers to eat a worse diet.
    12
    13   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   Yes.
    14
    15   MS. STEEL:   Can I just also refer actually to the evidence of
    16        Peter Cox, who was a former marketing consultant and also
    17        former chief executive of The Vegetarian Society?  He gave
    18        evidence as an expert in relation to the marketing of
    19        food.  Just in relation to the point about them not
    20        alerting the public to the dangers of eating a high fat,
    21        low fibre, et cetera, diet.  He pointed out that the 'Good
    22        Food Nutrition and McDonald's' pamphlet does make it clear
    23        that McDonald's were aware in 1985 of the links between
    24        diet and disease, and that his opinion therefore was that
    25        the effect of the company's efforts to promote their
    26        products as good nutritious food over the years was to
    27        debase the concept of healthy eating to no more than a
    28        cynical sales promotional ploy.
    29
    30        He went on to say that the company's claim that it was
    31        concerned about healthy eating was not borne out by the
    32        products that they sold; that even their salads, which are
    33        in fact only available in some of their stores, have a
    34        ludicrously high fat content with over 50 percent of the
    35        calories coming from fat, which is way over the government
    36        recommendations.  We heard that at the time that he was
    37        giving evidence the company were promoting their newest
    38        menu item, the MegaMac -- I am not sure whether that is
    39        still available or not -- which comprised of four meat
    40        patties and had huge amounts of fat and saturated fat.
    41        I think that showed that they do not have any serious
    42        desire or intention to promote healthy eating or to really
    43        improve the situation of what is available and how they
    44        promote it within their stores.
    45
    46        You might remember that Mr. Morris put to one of McDonald's
    47        witnesses about the suggestion that -- I think they were
    48        saying that healthier products were hard to produce, or
    49        something, or were not as fast.  Everything was about being
    50        fast, and Mr. Morris suggested a fruit bowl and the company
    51        did not...  Well, were not receptive to that, anyway, which
    52        is an indication of how serious their intent is as well.
    53        Mr. Cox said that there was a huge credibility gap with
    54        McDonald's -- the difference between the image that they
    55        portrayed and the reality of the food that they sold -- and
    56        he believed that the few positive steps that they had taken
    57        had been taken rather grudgingly as a result of public
    58        pressure, which is exactly our position.  If I could just
    59        have a second to sort that out.
    60

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