Day 130 - 26 May 95 - Page 66
1 Q. I am not asking to bring up anything for the sake of it. I
2 am asking whether you are interested, as you have asserted,
3 in risk management when you consider various areas of
4 potential fundamental problems -----
5
6 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What Mrs. Barnes has said is, in effect, she
7 does not see this as an area which carries with it a
8 fundamental problem so far as safety is concerned.
9
10 MR. MORRIS: That is not what you said when you went through the
11 accident book.
12
13 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What she has said is when people are new they
14 tend to have more minor accidents, but she does not
15 obviously see that as an area of fundamental problem with
16 regard to safety.
17
18 You may argue in due course she is wrong about that. By
19 that time I will have had a lot more evidence, and the
20 first thing I will have to decide is whether there are a
21 lot of accidents at McDonald's. If there are, then I may
22 have to look for the reasons. If I decide at the end of
23 the day that there is absolutely nothing untoward about
24 McDonald's safety record, then I will not have to look at
25 it, but we are just part way through the evidence on this.
26
27 MR. MORRIS: I think we have virtually finished. Is it possible
28 to have a five-minute break? Could we make it 10 minutes?
29
30 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
31
32 (Short Adjournment)
33
34 MR. MORRIS: If the under-reporting rate for RIDDOR accidents is
35 something you have claimed between 10 and 15 per cent now
36 and 20 per cent before, and those are offences not to
37 report which could lead to the Company being taken to court
38 so, presumably, management have a pretty high awareness of
39 their duty to report those, yes?
40 A. Well, put it this way, if we find out that they have
41 not reported one, senior management will follow up with
42 them in the strongest of terms because they are putting
43 their own, you know, themselves at risk as well as the
44 Company.
45
46 Q. So, is it not common sense that the under-reporting rate in
47 the injury book is going to be far higher than for RIDDOR
48 accidents?
49 A. Well, it is not the manager's responsibility to write
50 the accidents in the accident book; it is the crew members.
51
52 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I think the point being made is, if you have,
53 say, 10 or 20 per cent of serious accidents which should be
54 reported, according to the Regulations, are not being, you
55 would expect a much greater percentage of under-reporting
56 of small accidents. If I was a crew member, there would be
57 absolutely no legal need for me to report a relatively
58 small burn or cut on a finger and put it in the accident
59 book.
60 A. I think there is a slight misunderstanding here, that
