Day 300 - 14 Nov 96 - Page 39
1 Fairgrieve at the moment. I might try and put some more in
2 writing when I have had a chance to read his evidence.
3 I just wanted to refer to some of the admissions made by
4 McDonald's.
5
6 On 17th May 1993, McDonald's admitted that the artificial
7 character ronald mcdonald used in advertisements by the
8 Plaintiffs is well known to children and is intended to
9 appeal to them.
10
11 They admitted -- this is on 25th May 1994 -- that a study
12 carried out by McDonald's headquarters in the USA in the
13 '70s found that in three out of four families it was the
14 children who decided where to eat. Obviously, the purpose
15 of that study must have been for the effective targeting of
16 advertising. They also admitted in the United Kingdom in
17 November 1990 the Advertising Standards Authority ruled
18 that McDonald's advertisement was misleading, which claimed
19 that chemicals only played a small part in McDonald's
20 food.
21
22 I think, in fact, when Mr. Hawkes was giving evidence we
23 asked him about this ruling. Actually, this might have
24 been Mr. Rampton asked him, I can't remember who asked him,
25 but, anyway, on day 42, page 14, line 53 he said he was
26 happy to say that on this occasion McDonald's had got it
27 wrong, and he agreed that the advert was misleading by
28 omission. I think that that can be taken as a recognition
29 as an example that McDonald's do not tell the public all
30 the facts when they are claiming that the food that they
31 sell is nutritious.
32
33 I think that is particularly so considering the fact that
34 they had already been wrapped over the knuckles for exactly
35 the same thing in America when they put out an
36 advertisement about their shakes claiming that there were
37 not many chemicals in them and omitting to mention the ones
38 that there were in them. I think it is also a recognition,
39 the fact that they are trying to hide from the public that
40 there are chemicals in their food is also a recognition
41 that there is something wrong with the chemicals, and that
42 people do not particularly want to eat food with artificial
43 chemical colourants and flavourings in them.
44
45 Just on the bit about deceptive advertisements, obviously
46 there is the association of McDonald's with sport in
47 McDonald's advertisements, and also you probably remember
48 the Ronald and the nutrients clip which I think went round
49 to schools purportedly giving nutritional advice to
50 children, but in reality acting as an advertisement for
51 McDonald's. We would say that all those things are
52 deceptive and, you know, misleading the public by trying to
53 make them think that McDonald's food is a useful and
54 nutritious part of any diet.
55
56 There is a further admission on the same date that in or
57 around April 1990 a court in Finland banned a McDonald's
58 television advertisement stating that it exploited the
59 loneliness of a child and could give the impression that
60 McDonald's products can replace friends or lessen
