Day 059 - 01 Dec 94 - Page 50
1 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No. I was not pretending to have any
2 knowledge of what amount of recycling, if any, went on so
3 long ago.
4
5 MR. RAMPTON: If in due course Mr. Bateman has to come to court,
6 it is something that he might well know the answer to.
7 What I am really concerned about obviously in this case,
8 Mr. Oakley, is this, is whether it can fairly be said that
9 -- I would like your response to this -- McDonald's use of
10 recycled paper for its packaging was a late afterthought?
11 A. No, I do not think it was and it cannot fairly be
12 said. A lot of recycling was taking place in McDonald's
13 with customer packaging and with transportation packaging
14 pretty early on in the 80s and in some cases before.
15
16 Q. The second question is this, to what extent, if any, was
17 the move towards recycled content a consequence of
18 McDonald's desire to create for itself what I might call a
19 user-friendly image in the public mind?
20 A. I think that was a consideration without a doubt. It
21 certainly was not the prime mover but it was a
22 consideration.
23
24 Q. No. What was the prime mover?
25 A. The prime mover to recycle?
26
27 Q. Yes, to use recycled.
28 A. To use recycled material? Was really the more virgin
29 paper you use and pulp that you use, the less is available
30 generally. As supply and demand situation comes into play,
31 if we all only ever used virgin paper, the supply would
32 probably be greater than the demand and the price would
33 rocket. So, it is really a commercial consideration from
34 that point of view.
35
36 Q. Do you see any conflict between being environmentally
37 friendly as a fact, being commercially interested in the
38 sense of trying to preserve or keep down as far as you can
39 the price of the material which you buy and, on the third
40 hand (if we can have three hands), pleasing the customer's
41 sense of an environmentally friendly package? Do you see
42 any conflict between those three strands?
43 A. No, I do not.
44
45 Q. Can I move now -- you will be pleased to hear that this is
46 my penultimate topic, Mr. Oakley; I shall deal with environment/index.html">litter
47 very briefly at the end -- and deal now with the packaging
48 which is not, as it were, put into the hand of a customer
49 in the store, but that which is used to keep the product in
50 the store and to get it there in the first place? What is
51 the principal form of paper packaging which is used for
52 those two latter purposes?
53 A. For transportation?
54
55 Q. Yes, transportation and storage.
56 A. And storage, is an outer case which usually made from
57 a corrugated cardboard.
58
59 Q. Corrugated cardboard?
60 A. Yes.
