Day 150 - 07 Jul 95 - Page 29
1 then I do not think any self-minding individual would
2 continue to work in that environment if they were being
3 subjected to that sort of blackmail or those sorts of work
4 practices, either directly or indirectly.
5
6 Q. Just as a general impression, do you get the impression
7 that people who are working for McDonald's are absolutely
8 desperate and there is nothing else that they can do and so
9 they have to stay with the Company?
10 A. I am well aware there are plenty of things for them to
11 do, plenty of other jobs. Having just spend a night down
12 in the West End having a look at the different sorts of
13 restaurants that are available, it is similar, if not in
14 numbers, but certainly in the makeup of restaurants in
15 different towns, there are plenty of opportunities for them
16 to go and look for a similar type of job. That is what
17 I tell my managers -- told my managers at the time and
18 still do now -- is that it is a competitive market. If you
19 do not treat people properly, they are going to go
20 elsewhere, and they can go elsewhere.
21
22 Q. You have anticipated my question because I was going to ask
23 you what the consequence for the Company of behaving in the
24 ways that might be alleged were, but I think you have
25 answered that.
26
27 When the store gets a bit less busy and maybe, this being
28 an imperfect world, it has not been anticipated that it is
29 going to be quite so quiet as actually occurs ---
30 A. Right.
31
32 Q. -- are people sent home on the basis that they have got a
33 poor appearance, even if they are perfectly well dressed?
34 I mean, is it used as some sort of bogus pretext?
35 A. No, we would approach it in exactly same way as if
36 people were being asked to stay on. The idea of asking for
37 volunteers, if you like, in my experience, people are quite
38 happy to finish an hour earlier. I agree there are
39 circumstances maybe we do not anticipate a drop in
40 business, as we do not, perhaps, anticipate a rise in
41 business, but in those cases it is once again the idea of
42 you have to work with that person the next day, so if you
43 start treating them in that respect, then we are going to
44 be on a sort of losing pitch from day one.
45
46 Q. So are you saying that it does or it does not happen, the
47 practice of sending people home on the trumped up pretext
48 that ---
49 A. Absolutely not.
50
51 Q. -- their appearance is not good even if their appearance is
52 perfectly good?
53 A. Absolutely not.
54
55 Q. Another side to that, are people kept on regardless of
56 their appearance if the store is busy and there is a lot of
57 money to be made?
58 A. It is a very short term view if you were to keep people
59 on purely on that respect. At the end of the day it sends
60 a very bad message to the rest of staff. It sends an
