Day 199 - 11 Dec 95 - Page 07


     
     1   Q.   "So far as I was aware, there was no official McDonald's
     2        rule which prevented any employee of the Company from
     3        joining a union.  If anybody had joined a union and had
     4        kept completely quiet about the fact, I believe they would
     5        have been left alone.  Even if management were aware that a
     6        person was a member of a union, they would not necessarily
     7        dismiss that person so long as he/she remained 100 per cent
     8        dormant.  However, a union member who became active in any
     9        way would not last long at all.
    10
    11        For example, if that member starting to try to recruit
    12        other crew members in the union or starting trying to
    13        organise employees in some way that was not in the interest
    14        of management he/she would mostly find his/her employment
    15        at McDonald's short-lived".
    16
    17        Did the company speak to you about unions at any time?
    18        A.  During our training in induction when we joined
    19        McDonald's, we were told that basically McDonald's were not
    20        anti-union but that the way McDonald's was set up, there
    21        was really no need for there to be any unions there because
    22        of their open door policy, where any crew member could, in
    23        theory, go along to any member of management, and also
    24        through their rap sessions where they could air any
    25        grievances.  They felt because of the way they run their
    26        operation that there was really no call for them to even
    27        want to be in a union in the first place.
    28
    29   Q.   Why do you say then your impression that they were
    30        anti-union or they would not tolerate?
    31        A.  It was, sort of, implied in the way it was put across
    32        that unions were basically -- unions at McDonald's would
    33        not get on.
    34
    35   Q.   "I think it is fair to say that unions were an 'unspoken
    36        taboo'.  McDonald's would never admit to the fact that
    37        unions were taboo.  In fact, they publicly state that they
    38        allow their employees to be members of a union.  However,
    39        the reality behind this is very different and the system
    40        operates in such a way that any active member of a union
    41        will not be tolerated.  The system will simply not support
    42        crew members who adopt a position contrary to management.
    43
    44        Most of the crew in my store were generally made to feel as
    45        though they were fully expendable.  According to the theory
    46        of McDonald's training, if a crew member was not doing what
    47        he/she should, management were supposed to file a report,
    48        give a warning or discipline the member of staff.  This
    49        process was meant to be carried out in private, the crew
    50        member having been taken off the floor, into the Manager's 
    51        office and the misdemeanour discussed with him/her away 
    52        from rest of the crew.  In fact, the reality was that an 
    53        errant crew member would just be given repeated toilet
    54        duty".  Can you just explain what that is?
    55        A.  If you had a troublesome crew member, you would just
    56        give them nasty jobs to do all the time, i.e. if they were
    57        coming in in the morning, you would make them do filtering
    58        every time they came in, i.e. filtering all the --
    59        recycling, filtering all the machines out, or you would put
    60        them on lobby or you would put them on any area that you

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