Day 181 - 01 Nov 95 - Page 32
1 before us, as you have rightly pointed out, is a certain
2 amount of transparency of publicly available information
3 which was never available when wages councils were in
4 operation. It could -- it was only hypothetical, but
5 I think the question you are putting to me is of that
6 nature. Hypothetically, if this information, such as you
7 have revealed, had been available to someone like me in the
8 mid 80s, as a council member, I would have probably
9 referred it on for a report.
10
11 Q. One final question on this matter of overtime, Mr. Pearson,
12 and then I am going to turn to something else. Do you
13 happen to remember -- this is really a request for
14 assistance -- the name of the principal Inspector, if there
15 was such a thing, in the London region in the late 1980s?
16 A. No. His number is in my diary still, in fact, but I do
17 not -- Baldwin, Mr. Baldwin.
18
19 Q. Never mind. I thought it might be on the tip of your
20 tongue, but it is a long time ago. I am not criticising
21 you for that. Can we pass on, please, to the question of
22 turnover. That is my penultimate topic and then we will
23 have a look at health and safety at work and that will be
24 it.
25 A. I dealt with the Secretary of the Wages Inspectorate,
26 Mr. Cottingham.
27
28 Q. Mr. Cottingham, that was the Secretary, was it?
29 A. Yes.
30
31 Q. It maybe a different thing, but thank you very much.
32
33 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Cottingham?
34 A. I think the name is in the order.
35
36 MR. RAMPTON: I see.
37 A. It can be checked.
38
39 Q. He is a national Civil Servant, is he?
40 A. Well, I do not know what he does now.
41
42 Q. No, no -- was?
43 A. But then he was the Secretary of the wages councils and
44 he was actually the contact point. You would not go to the
45 Senior Inspector; you would go to the Secretary.
46
47 Q. Just a few questions, please, Mr. Pearson, about turnover:
48 What do you understand by turnover in this context, when a
49 Company says its annual turnover of staff is 120 per cent
50 and so on, what do you take that to mean?
51 A. Well, the staff changes numerically, the corporate
52 number changes at least once a year and a shade more.
53
54 Q. Once and a bit. What it means, does it not -- see if I am
55 right about this because I always find it slightly a
56 conundrum -- at least 20 per cent of the 120 per cent, yes,
57 has arrived and left in the same year?
58 A. No, no. 100 per cent turnover is that numerically they
59 have all gone. If you have a work force of 100 and the
60 turnover is 100 per cent, have they not all gone
