Day 179 - 30 Oct 95 - Page 23
1
2 MR. MORRIS: I am just moving on through the statement to see
3 what I need to ask. (To the witness): You have said that
4 you find it alarming, looking back, that the labour rate
5 was the only thing taken into account when setting staffing
6 levels, safety played absolutely no part. Then you said
7 about inexperienced staff members were regularly left on
8 potentially dangerous equipment by themselves. An obvious
9 question is, how did the store manage to keep going when it
10 was being understaffed?
11 A. Everyone was under pressure to work very hard and very
12 fast and corners were cut.
13
14 Q. You have said when the store was busy a full-time worker
15 could do 60 to 70 hours per week, what do you mean "could
16 do"?
17 A. During the holiday periods that would not be unusual
18 for a full-time over 18, male or female. It would depend
19 how understaffed the store was at the time. At that time
20 the stores were always looking for employees and the "Help
21 wanted" signs were permanently up.
22
23 Q. You have said when you were under 18 you regularly worked
24 past midnight; what do you mean by "regularly"?
25 A. Most shifts when I finished at 12 o'clock were
26 scheduled to finish at 12 o'clock. I would be asked to
27 stay on, or if the store was short of staff (which was not
28 unusual) I would be pressured to stay on or be told that
29 I could not go because I had not cleaned my area properly,
30 and I might be made to stay until 1.00 or 2.00 until the
31 area was deemed appropriately clean.
32
33 Q. Can I just ask you a question? Was anybody at the store
34 aware, or were you aware, or did you become aware, that
35 this was an illegal practice?
36 A. Everybody knew, yes.
37
38 Q. Another obvious question: When you said "could work" 60,
39 70 hours, did that apply to you as well?
40 A. Yes.
41
42 Q. Why did you work such long hours?
43 A. Because I needed the money, and the only way you could
44 earn a reasonable wage was to do a lot of hours.
45
46 Q. You have said under 18 year old males working past midnight
47 was the normal, is there any reason why you specified
48 males?
49 A. Females under 18 were only allowed to work until 10.00,
50 and that would lead to a 2.00 to 10.00 shift which was not
51 very useful to the store. So, it would be very rare a
52 female would be finishing at 10.00, so, therefore, they
53 would not be there to be asked to stay on. They would not
54 be working.
55
56 Q. It just did not fit into the shift pattern at all?
57 A. Not really.
58
59 Q. Just one question about the filter machine, about it being
60 too expensive or something, not filling the maintenance
