Day 118 - 01 May 95 - Page 39


     
     1        What is being put to you is that it is generally accepted
     2        in McDonald's that your meal, the one you get without
     3        paying, is soft drink, sandwich and fries.  Retired
     4        superintendents or chief superintendents in the
     5        Metropolitan Police may get an apple pie as well, but the
     6        ordinary hourly worker just gets drink, fries and a
     7        sandwich.
     8        A.  I do not think that is right.  I think, generally
     9        speaking, they can take what they want but we would like to
    10        think that they will take no more than will satisfy their
    11        needs.
    12
    13   MR. MORRIS:  So, if any worker was sacked or disciplined for
    14        taking whatever food they wanted that they could eat, then
    15        they would have been wrongfully dismissed, in your opinion?
    16        A.  I do not know of anybody who has been; I have no
    17        knowledge of it.
    18
    19   Q.   If later it is shown -----
    20        A.  But I cannot answer that.  I have no knowledge of
    21        anyone who has been dismissed or disciplined over the food
    22        policy.
    23
    24   Q.   But if someone was, if it is later shown to the court and
    25        proven, whatever, that somebody was dismissed for taking
    26        more food than the management allowed, that would
    27        contravene McDonald's policy, that they were sacked or
    28        disciplined?
    29        A.  I cannot answer that question.  You are saying "if"
    30        and, to my knowledge, it has not happened.
    31
    32   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Mr. Morris is entitled to ask a hypothetical
    33        question, but again it seems there are two things.  If a
    34        manager says:  "You shall only have a soft drink, fries and
    35        a sandwich"; whether that is right or not, I can see that
    36        he might think that it was indiscipline anyway if someone
    37        helped themselves to some more.  But without a rule of that
    38        kind, would you think it ---
    39        A.  It would be very difficult.
    40
    41   Q.   -- wrong to sack someone -- this is what you are being
    42        asked -- if they took more than a soft drink, fries and a
    43        sandwich?
    44        A.  The trouble, my Lord, I have with a hypothetical
    45        question of that kind is I do not know all the
    46        circumstances.  If this is someone who has regularly done
    47        something like that, then I think the manager would be
    48        right to invoke discipline.  But if it were a one-off
    49        occasion and there was some reason why he did it, then,
    50        clearly -- I cannot answer the question because it is too 
    51        hypothetical. 
    52 
    53   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I suggest you leave it there.  You do not
    54        have to have a concession from Mr. Nicholson to argue that
    55        if someone was sacked for taking a cup of coffee or
    56        something, that is wrong.
    57
    58   MR. MORRIS:  Maybe it would be a good time to break now?
    59
    60   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  We will resume at five to two.

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