Day 181 - 01 Nov 95 - Page 22
1 Q. You must have been well used by the end of 1986 to judging
2 whether or not somebody was telling the truth?
3 A. Yes.
4
5 Q. Not all your members always tell you the truth, do they?
6 A. That is an outrageous suggestion.
7
8 Q. Outrageous suggestion? So every time a trade unionist
9 opens his mouth he is telling the truth, is that what you
10 are telling his Lordship?
11 A. You know I made that remark with a pinch of salt.
12
13 Q. Yes.
14 A. Of course, every person that comes to you for advice,
15 you have to weigh up what they are saying based on the
16 facts, your experience and so forth. So, clearly, I did
17 take a view as to the strength of the evidence before me,
18 and in this particular case I did not believe, although
19 I believed the story, I did not believe it amounted to a
20 winnable industrial tribunal case and, in any case, the
21 fundamental point is this: Did he want to go to a
22 tribunal? Did he want to pursue the case legally? Did he
23 want to keep his job, and what was my judgment as to the
24 handling of this case?
25
26 I, as a trade union official, do not stand in relation to
27 the law like a solicitor does. You stand as a trade union
28 official in relation to these laws in a slightly different
29 way. What you do is you weigh up the industrial relations
30 context and, in my professional judgment, on the facts
31 presented to me, it would have been inappropriate to pursue
32 the case with an industrial tribunal, better not to put the
33 employee's job at risk, better to adopt the strategy, in my
34 opinion, one which made him very glum but, in my opinion,
35 was the right one, of getting him back to work and then
36 considering a recruitment initiative at the restaurant from
37 outside. That is the approach I adopted. I was aware of
38 the law; I chose not to exercise it.
39
40 Q. I am sure you are aware of the law. What I am suggesting
41 is this, Mr. Pearson, that if you had thought that this was
42 a genuine complaint which ought to be investigated and, so
43 far as possible, remedied, I am not suggesting you should
44 have compelled him to go to a tribunal, there was nothing
45 to stop you picking up the telephone, ringing up McDonald's
46 Headquarters in East Finchley, or even a Manager of the
47 restaurant, and saying: "Look, I have a member who has a
48 complaint; what are you going to do about it?" Why did you
49 not do that?
50 A. Well, if this whole trial is a metaphor of industrial
51 relations in McDonald's, then that is the answer. There
52 were no contacts between the trade union and the Company.
53
54 Q. Do you remember -----
55 A. There were no channels of communication.
56
57 Q. You managed to speak to Mr. Sid Nicholson at some stage,
58 did you not, because you asked him whether you could go
59 into, I think it was, the Hackney restaurant and talk to
60 the people there about joining the union, did you not?
