Day 275 - 08 Jul 96 - Page 29


     
     1        notes, the meeting on 25th January 1990 was never called a
     2        McDonald's campaign meeting.  It was always a meeting about
     3        the future of the group.  Page 58, the 11th January 1990,
     4        Mr. Pocklington.  In the fourth paragraph Mr. Pocklington
     5        describes that "the meeting continued until 10.40 p.m.
     6        continuing so long because much time was taken up talking
     7        with the new four people explaining the group."
     8
     9             Just to say that this would be typical of the way that
    10        the meetings were conducted.  If somebody new attended,
    11        there was always an effort made to explain to them the
    12        origins of the group, and who was involved, and if any
    13        campaign any particular campaign was discussed, then
    14        background information would be given about the campaign,
    15        the history of the campaign, so that -- and acronyms would
    16        be explained.  The purpose of that was so that new people
    17        could get involved if they wanted to.  People there did not
    18        want the group to be, like, really cliquey, where only
    19        people who had been going for ages and ages knew, you know,
    20        could understand, what was being discussed and what was
    21        going on.  You know, that was a particular point the group
    22        made in the way it operated.  If people charged headlong
    23        into talking about some campaign without giving any
    24        background information, then it would in my experience it
    25        was quite usual for someone to butt in and say, look, hang
    26        on there, so and so is here, they have not been before, you
    27        had better tell them, you know, a bit of the background, or
    28        let me explain a bit of the background so that, you know,
    29        they can understand what we are talking about.
    30
    31             The other thing -- well, I do not know whether it
    32        matters, but just that no one knew about the whereabouts of
    33        the group archives.  The group had moved office several
    34        times within the building and also, I think, from outside
    35        the building.  I cannot remember when that was, though.
    36        And things as far as record keeping went, things were
    37        pretty haphazard.
    38
    39             Page 60 of the notes, Mr. Claire.
    40
    41   MR. MORRIS:  Sorry, what date are we on?
    42        A.  Sorry, 18th January 1990.  Firstly, with respect to
    43        Paul, I have never heard Paul say that he was the author of
    44        all anti-McDonald's leaflets.  I know he prepared the short
    45        A5 leaflet and I know that he has prepared press releases,
    46        but I have certainly never heard him say that he wrote all
    47        of them, nor anything to suggest that he had written the
    48        fact sheet and, as I say, every time that was ever brought
    49        up it was always said that the person was no longer
    50        involved with the group.
    51
    52             Going on to what it says about me.  Firstly, I would
    53        not have taken control of the meeting.  He says I wrote the
    54        minutes and the agenda.  I may well have been the person
    55        who, on that date, took a piece of paper and started the
    56        agenda off.  I would not have written out the entire
    57        agenda, and I would not have any form of control over
    58        anybody there.  It may be that on that occasion, you know,
    59        if a discussion appeared to have come to an end I said 'the
    60        next thing on the agenda is such and such', but I was not

Prev Next Index