Day 295 - 06 Nov 96 - Page 20


     
     1   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   Is that the typhoid?
     2
     3   MR. MORRIS:   Yes, and I am not sure how relevant that is to
     4        this case, except that cross-contamination obviously can
     5        occur by the handling of the products in McDonald's stores,
     6        and that is something which the Preston outbreak official
     7        report had identified as part of the problem, from what I
     8        remember.  So the date of those last admissions were 22nd
     9        March 1995.
    10
    11        I think the other relevant admission was made on this issue
    12        of the case regarding the additives used in their food.
    13        There was an admission made on 15th December 1993 that,
    14        "McDonald's pride themselves on the uniformity of their
    15        products throughout the world and that in order to achieve
    16        that uniformity they have set formulae and specifications
    17        for menu items and use a number of additives in the
    18        preparation of their food."
    19
    20        The only other admission, I think, of relevance to this
    21        section is under the advertising admissions.  Admitted on
    22        25th May 1994, admission H.  "In the United Kingdom in
    23        November 1990 the Advertising Standards Authority ruled
    24        that a McDonald's advertisement was misleading which
    25        claimed that chemicals only played a small part in
    26        McDonald's foods."  I think that covers the admissions.
    27
    28        Why they came up with it was because we were talking about
    29        the potential, the existence of risk because of the
    30        contamination of the products and the potential there
    31        exists for them not to be cooked properly, and obviously,
    32        we say that potential is substantial.  But the potential
    33        clearly exists because of what we have heard in this case,
    34        admissions and the food poisoning outbreak at Preston, et
    35        cetera.  Those are just the admissions.  We obviously had
    36        quite a number of other evidence which we would believe
    37        demonstrates that undercooking is a regular problem in
    38        McDonald's stores.
    39
    40        If I can carry going through the notes we have served with
    41        the references to the transcripts.
    42
    43   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes.
    44
    45   MR. MORRIS:   As far as page 58 goes, if I can just direct your
    46        attention to the two references from day 104, page 28, page
    47        30 of the transcripts.  This was the-----
    48
    49   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   Hold on a moment.  Who is this?
    50        Mr. Bennett?
    51
    52   MR. MORRIS:   This is Mr. Bennett, yes.  Obviously, our witness
    53        Marja Hovi, we believe, was again one of the few witnesses
    54        that Mr. Rampton made an effort to cross-examine fully
    55        and-----
    56
    57   MR. RAMPTON:   My Lord, I don't accept Mr. Morris's insulting
    58        terminology.  The word 'effort' should not be there.
    59
    60   MR. MORRIS:   Sorry, I withdraw the word 'effort'.  He

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