Day 186 - 10 Nov 95 - Page 54
1 representing our case accurately if he thinks that is what
2 we said.
3
4 MR. RAMPTON: That is a -----
5
6 MR. MORRIS: When I held up those posters the second one said,
7 "Eating junk food causes" -----
8
9 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I have to say that there is quite enough to
10 consider sticking to what is in this leaflet without
11 troubling about what may be in other publications.
12
13 MR. RAMPTON: What this leaflet may say about junk food
14 generally or capitalism generally is, I have to say,
15 completely beside the point. If one looks at the leaflet
16 as a whole, starting with the cover and reading the
17 headlines and so on, this leaflet is principally about
18 McDonald's. Anything that it says about capitalism or fast
19 food companies generally applies with particular force to
20 McDonald's. That argument is completely beside the point.
21
22 My Lord, in relation to context and the strength of the
23 message, the gravity of risk conveyed by the nutrition
24 passage, I would like to draw particular attention to the
25 last paragraph of the introduction on the first inside
26 page. This is entirely specific to McDonald's: "The more
27 you find out about McDonald's processed food, the less
28 attractive it becomes as this leaflet will show. The truth
29 about hamburgers is enough to put you off them for life".
30
31 My Lord, in other words, as I said before, do not touch
32 them with a barge pole. The person who is considering
33 whether to start smoking or to give it up, when he reads
34 the government message, does not say to himself, "Well,
35 I wonder whether it would be safe to have a few or a packet
36 or two or to smoke for a year". What he says to himself
37 is, "This practice is dangerous, and for that reason I will
38 not buy cigarettes", or, "I will stop buying them". My
39 Lord, that is the message which, amongst other things in
40 the leaflet, that paragraph conveys. There is nothing in
41 the text of the leaflet or in the headings or in the
42 cartoon to detract from that powerful health warning, if
43 I may call it that.
44
45 Only one other thing, and I will be much faster than
46 I thought because I have not had to deal with the question
47 of deception, and that is this: There was, at some stage
48 in this afternoon's argument -- I cannot remember by which
49 of the Defendants it was advanced -- a submission that the
50 leaflet does not make -- and this is in relation to meaning
51 H particularly, though, of course, it will come in again
52 throughout the argument later on in the case -- the leaflet
53 does not make a suggestion that McDonald's and what they
54 do, or, as the Defendants would say, misdo, are not
55 motivated by profit; merely that the effect of what they
56 do, their malpractices (as the defendants would have it) is
57 that they make money out of it.
58
59 MS. STEEL: That was just about one specific point, not about
60 -- it was not about the leaflet in general.
