Day 188 - 15 Nov 95 - Page 64
1
2 I am a student at North London Polytechnic
3 studying geography. I am now in my second year
4 and worked at McDonald's during my first year
5 purely out of the need for extra money.
6
7 The Seven Sisters McDonald's was literally just
8 over the road from the Polytechnic and was
9 therefore the most convenient place to work.
10 I saw an advertisement in the window and went
11 in. The advertisement is permanently on
12 display.
13
14 I started on ú2.19 per hour. After 6 p.m. in
15 the evening the rate went up to approximately
16 ú2.39 per hour. After 11 p.m. the rate went up
17 again to approximately ú2.59 per hour. The
18 store operated monthly assessments of all
19 members of staff. If you got a high assessment
20 you got a salary rise, but this was entirely at
21 the Manager's discretion. An employee had to
22 work very hard to get a rise.
23
24 I never got a single rise in the eight months
25 that I was there and was also not promoted in
26 any way. Promotion was also entirely at the
27 Manager's discretion. The sort of people who
28 are 'successful' in McDonald's terms were the
29 sort of people who would do literally anything
30 in order to carry favour with management and
31 were prepared to take no end of misery for very
32 small returns. I would estimate that there were
33 approximately 20 per cent who were very
34 'successful employees', 20 per cent who did not
35 give a damn about McDonald's like myself
36 - people who were only there because they
37 needed the money - and the rest was somewhere
38 between the two.
39
40 I first became involved with the Transport and
41 General Workers Union after being at McDonald's
42 for about six months. I do not know why I did
43 not get involved any sooner - it just had not
44 occurred to me. It might have been an
45 advertisement or a leaflet for the TGWU which
46 sparked off my first visit. Philip Pearson, a
47 TGWU official, told me about the legal minimum
48 wage - he gave me a leaflet on it; I did not
49 mention the question of a legal minimum wage to
50 management - it just did not occur to me to do
51 so. There did not seem any point. In fact,
52 I did not mention any aspect of my contact with
53 the TGWU to the management.
54
55 I joined the TGWU. I also got a large number of
56 leaflets and application forms from Philip
57 Pearson and started talking to people within the
58 store. The people I spoke to were generally
59 very interested in joining. I approached some
60 30 to 40 employees and every single one was
