Day 134 - 13 Jun 95 - Page 18
1 it.
2
3 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Make them in due course. If Ms. Mead had
4 said that she had carried out some research or particular
5 enquiry, she might be able to elaborate but she said that
6 she has not.
7
8 MR. MORRIS: From your knowledge, say, for example, if we look
9 at 0 to one month -----
10
11 MR. JUSTICE BELL: About one in 15 people.
12
13 MR. MORRIS: They do not all leave after one day ---
14 A. No.
15
16 Q. -- do they, or they do not usually leave exactly on the
17 month. If we can fair enough say it should be somewhere in
18 the middle?
19 A. Yes, you could certainly -----
20
21 MR. MORRIS: No, she might say that most of those leave in one
22 day.
23
24 THE WITNESS: I do not know.
25
26 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, I am sorry, this is supposed to be the
27 evidence; not Mr. Morris makes the witness try to agree
28 with what may or may not be a common sense assumption
29 which, in any event, is for your Lordship and not for the
30 witness. If the witness knows as a fact that it is so,
31 that the average leaving time within that bracket is two
32 weeks or whatever, then let her say so. If she does not
33 know, then this questioning should stop and we should go
34 somewhere else.
35
36 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If Ms. Mead does not know, I cannot attach
37 any weight to her answer whether she agrees or not. Do not
38 forget, it is not saying when people leave; it is saying
39 the length of time they have actually been in service. You
40 may ask me in due course to draw a conclusion that on
41 balance probabilities that means X per cent.
42
43 MR. MORRIS: It has to, if it is over a year it has to.
44
45 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No. All that document shows -- you have your
46 turnover figures which you may wish to combine with this to
47 invite me to draw a conclusion, but all this says is that
48 in this quarter and the equivalent quarter for the previous
49 year something like one in 15 employees had been with
50 McDonald's for a month or less. Unfortunately, Ms. Mead
51 cannot help us any further on her own experience.
52
53 MR. MORRIS: Rather than ask questions, if I can just make my
54 calculation on the basis of these figures on the length of
55 stay, a typical length of stay, of McDonald's employees,
56 that based upon the first quarter quoted of the figures,
57 the percentages, if we take an average store of a 100
58 people as an example to make the calculation easier --
59 other people can make this calculation, if they wish --
60 I have calculated that from the bottom upwards the first
