Day 302 - 18 Nov 96 - Page 38
1 went up about five pence in a three year period. Five
2 pence an hour would be something like a pound extra or two
3 pounds extra a week.
4
5 So the decency threshold, which Europe was setting to keep
6 up presumably with inflation, was going higher faster than
7 McDonald's wage rises in the same period, which exactly
8 again justifies what it says in the fact sheet about the
9 lack of minimum wage protection, meaning that the company
10 could pay what it liked or what it could get away with.
11
12 He says that £221.50 a week was calculated gross weekly
13 earnings. It was the question you asked before, page 13,
14 line 14. Based on gross weekly earnings for full time
15 employees in this country on adult rates working a 37.7
16 hour week.
17
18 MR. JUSTICE BELL: 37.7?
19
20 MR. MORRIS: Yes. So if you multiplied McDonald's wage rates,
21 I think for example, I think we had, I might be wrong, it
22 was the Heathrow actual average wage for the Heathrow store
23 was calculated each week, and it was something like £3.43
24 or something, £3.35, £3.45, that kind of level. That is
25 entirely from memory. I have not had a chance to look at
26 the papers.
27
28 So if you multiplied that as a typical average by 37.7,
29 I think that was for 1994 as well, that was Heathrow, you
30 would get what effectively the average wage at McDonald's
31 would be. Obviously there would be people below and people
32 above. And that would not come out to more than £140,
33 £150, I do not think. All these figures are based upon
34 European Community and the government's own new earnings
35 survey figures. He then pointed out that following the
36 Wage Council's abolition, Britain and Ireland are the only
37 two EU member states without cross industry minimum wage
38 systems.
39
40 He concludes on page 14 - I am not sure if this is exactly
41 a misprint or not, I don't think it is - it says, because
42 of the overall low hour policy - I think that must include
43 part-time work as well - at the company, low take-home pay
44 is an inbuilt feature of employment in the company.
45
46 Then he says, when labour targets are translated into
47 individual manager's performance targets - now, this is an
48 important part of the systematic management culture - and
49 form a key part of their individual appraisals - this is on
50 page 14, line 23 - then achieving them may of necessity
51 engender a disciplinarian, if not authoritarian management
52 style, dependent for its success on a highly flexible
53 workforce. And then he said that is borne out by the
54 employees' witness statements.
55
56 I think he has got the key here to the -- this is the
57 centre of McDonald's employment conditions here, we are
58 talking about trying to keep wage costs down, low pay, or
59 low pay is another aspect. Trying to keep wage costs down
60 obviously means low pay, but also means disciplinarian
