Day 302 - 18 Nov 96 - Page 34
1 average of that low paid section of workers who are below
2 the decency threshold about £174, but at that time -- but
3 of course McDonald's workers would be substantially less
4 where, if we count full-timers as being something like 35
5 hours, may be 37 hours or something -- they would have been
6 getting something like may be £150 a week.
7
8 That is if they were getting a full compliment of hours.
9 On page 8 -----
10
11 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I take your point about no guaranteed hours,
12 but the picture I have got is that the people who were
13 classed as full time essentially did get their expected
14 number of hours. That the people who were at risk, if
15 anyone was, were the part-timers. That does not gainsay a
16 point you have got that if I multiply so many pounds a week
17 by 39 you would say you still come up with a pretty paltry
18 figure, but -- was that not-----?
19
20 MR. MORRIS: Well, it probably averaged out as that, but there
21 no doubt were exceptions, may be even a large percentage of
22 full-timers who were not getting, say, 39 hours a week,
23 just as there were a large section of the 25 percent who
24 were getting over 39 hours a week. Then, you know, by
25 definition, there must have been some getting less of
26 whatever the average was. I did remember -- no. I thought
27 it was a figure that we had as an average, but we did not
28 have one. But, yes, I don't think that is a major thing.
29
30 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What it seems to me, if there is a vice in
31 not giving guaranteed hours, is that it may not be a
32 problem with the full-timers, although one can see it is a
33 greater problem to them if they do not get hours, because
34 they may want every last pound in order to pay their weekly
35 bills. But the people on part-time hours, a number of them
36 are students or they may be women contributing to the
37 family budget and they would like to think they can be sure
38 of working a certain number of hours per week.
39
40 What is said on the other side is, well, of course, but the
41 system which does not allow guaranteed hours does have a
42 flexibility which means they can be offered some hours
43 work. And that is a difficulty I see with lack of
44 guaranteed hours.
45
46 Low pay is another thing absolutely. That I see as more
47 absolute.
48
49 MR. MORRIS: The point about the no guaranteed hours thing as
50 well, though, to be crystal clear, is it does give an
51 enormous amount of power to the management.
52
53 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
54
55 MR. MORRIS: So, carrying on with page 8, Mr. Pearson explains
56 his site visits that he made as an expert on our behalf to
57 McDonald's stores, two of them in Hackney, I think they
58 were in Hackney -- no, one in Seven Sisters in Islington
59 and one in Hackney, Mare Street, were of limited value due
60 to the constraints imposed by McDonald's. That was in his
