Day 300 - 14 Nov 96 - Page 29


     
     1        called free speech.  What we are talking about is what
     2        I would consider the good manners of an advertisement.  We
     3        are not saying that other people should not express that
     4        view."
     5
     6        Obviously, that is exactly the view that is being expressed
     7        in the London Greenpeace fact sheet which McDonald's are
     8        suing us over.  So their own witness thinks it perfectly
     9        reasonable for us to express the view that it is a negative
    10        thing, that it is a bad thing for people to be advertising
    11        to children with the effect that the children then go and
    12        pester their parents or nag their parents.  That was all on
    13        day 47, pages 39 and 40.  I can't remember whether I have
    14        already given a reference or not.
    15
    16        Mr. Miles said that if an advertising campaign undermined
    17        loyalty to parents it would be something to take
    18        seriously.  Well, it was something that the ITC would take
    19        seriously.  That was on day 47, page 56 line 37.
    20
    21        Mr. Miles was referred to the operations manual about
    22        Ronald loving McDonald's and encouraging children to love
    23        McDonald's, and encouraging children to feel a loyalty to
    24        ronald mcdonald and McDonald's, and on day 47, page 58 he
    25        was read the quote, "'Ronald loves McDonald's and
    26        McDonald's food, and so do children because they love
    27        Ronald."  Question,  "Are they not saying it is important
    28        to generate love for that character because then the
    29        children will buy the food because the character likes the
    30        food?  In other words, because of their loyalty to the
    31        character, they would be loyal to the food sold by the
    32        company."  Mr. Miles said, "I think that they are saying
    33        something like that, but they are saying it to their
    34        franchisee, they are not saying this in an advertisement".
    35        And that if an advertisement started to talk about love for
    36        a character or love for a product, Mr. Miles said he would
    37        have thought that that would be over the top.
    38
    39        So the point is that here are McDonald's encouraging their
    40        franchisees to act in a manner which even McDonald's own
    41        witness would consider to be over the top if it was done in
    42        a more overt and public way.  Obviously, the operations
    43        manual does not just go to franchisees, it does mention
    44        employees.  It goes to the store managers, it goes to all
    45        stores throughout the world.
    46
    47        Mr. Miles confirmed that in Sweden the use of cartoon
    48        characters to promote food was restricted -- that was in
    49        advertising, that was day 50, page 34 -- and that some
    50        countries banned the use of toys in promotional
    51        activities.  That was day 50, page 33.
    52
    53        The other thing about Mr. Miles saying that he thought
    54        McDonald's ads were OK, apart from the fact that,
    55        obviously, he is working for a trade association which
    56        represents the interests of companies like McDonald's, he
    57        also accepted that many of the ITC regulations were open to
    58        interpretation.  That was day 47, page 35, line 22.
    59
    60        Can I just mention that Mr. Miles actually said that he was

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