Day 283 - 21 Oct 96 - Page 41


     
     1        directors, they were all people who one could easily
     2        identify as being currently compromised by their loyalty to
     3        McDonald's and what it stands for.  I think some have left
     4        the company, but I can't remember now.  But that can be
     5        dealt with when we go into the detail.  Secondly, some of
     6        the higher ranking, or all of the higher ranking,
     7        representatives of McDonald's who gave evidence can be said
     8        to have relied greatly on hearsay.  I do not think any of
     9        them were experts and therefore entitled to opinion on
    10        expert matters, and they greatly relied on hearsay about
    11        what happened in McDonald's and how things are enforced or
    12        not enforced, or whatever.
    13
    14        But, of course, hearsay, we submit, is allowable when it is
    15        an admission against interest.  And another thing to be
    16        borne in mind when the evidence is analysed is that a great
    17        many of the McDonald's witnesses were trained
    18        propagandists, public representatives of McDonald's who
    19        have been travelling the length and breadth of their own
    20        country, or indeed the world, promoting McDonald's.  So
    21        this is one reason that we felt it took some time on many
    22        occasions to get at what we felt the truth was behind the
    23        kind of official position that was being put in the witness
    24        box.
    25
    26        Another point was that the hearsay that most of McDonald's
    27        representatives, not so much the people that worked in the
    28        stores because they could speak from their own experience
    29        in many ways, although a lot of what they were talking
    30        about they would not have seen with their own eyes, whereas
    31        with our witnesses they were talking about what they saw
    32        with their own eyes, much of the matters, say, coming from
    33        Mr. Preston or Mr. Stein, or whatever, about what he had
    34        been told by other people in the McDonald's chain.  So it
    35        is hearsay about what other people in similar positions may
    36        be passing on to them, who also, of course, have an
    37        interest in promoting McDonald's corporation to each other,
    38        but they are reliant in many of the issues in the case on
    39        their suppliers for information about what really happens
    40        in the packaging, by the packaging manufacturers, beef
    41        suppliers, or whatever, and I think there is a particularly
    42        helpful and revealing comment by Dr. Gonzales.
    43
    44        I am just going to find it, Day 69, page 38 and 29.  It is
    45        really part of the cross-examination about the fact that
    46        the sales director of Co-op Montecillos had stated that
    47        they were sending beef for McDonald's use in the USA.  If
    48        you look at, especially, lines 30 to 33, it says here, "Can
    49        you clearly see during the film that there is some mention
    50        directed to the fast food restaurants because any 
    51        salesperson will tell you, if I am interested in buying 
    52        this piece of cloth will tell you that he has that 
    53        particular piece of cloth, suit or whatever".  And then he
    54        goes on saying, the next paragraph, bottom paragraph, about
    55        not knowing what he is talking about or lying about what he
    56        is talking about.
    57
    58        Now, it is very hard to understand Dr. Gonzales's evidence
    59        because it may be partly language and partly because, we
    60        will submit, he kept changing his line and was very

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