Day 001 - 28 Jun 94 - Page 11


     
     1        live in the open air in fields.  "Their deaths", that is
              the animals' deaths, "are bloody and barbaric."
     2
              Heading:  "Murdering a Big Mac".  Blob:  "In the
     3        slaughterhouse, animals often struggle to escape."
              False.  "Cattle become frantic as they watch the animal
     4        before them in the killing-line", false, "being prodded,
              beaten," is false, "electrocuted" in one sense is true,
     5         "and knifed."
 
     6        "A recent British government report criticised inefficient
              stunning methods which frequently result in animals having
     7        their throats cut while still fully conscious."  In so far
              as that sentence is supposed to apply to the animals used
     8        for McDonald's, again it is false.
 
     9        "McDonald's are responsible for the deaths of countless
              animals by this supposedly humane method.  We have the
    10        choice to eat meat or not.  The 450 million animals killed
              for food in Britain every year have no choice at all.  It
    11        is often said that after visiting an abattoir, people
              become nauseous at the thought of eating flesh. How many
    12        of us would be prepared to work in a slaughterhouse and
              kill the animals we eat?"
    13
              Another box with the heading:  "What is your poison?  Meat
    14        is responsible for 70% of all food-poisoning incidents,
              with chicken and minced meat (as used in burgers) being
    15        the worse offenders.  When animals are slaughtered, meat
              can be contaminated with gut contents, faeces and urine,
    16        leading to bacterial infection.  In an attempt to
              counteract infection in their animals, farmers routinely
    17        inject them with doses of antibiotics.  These, in addition
              to growth-promoting hormone drugs and pesticide residues
    18        in their feed, build up in the animals' tissues and can
              further damage the health  of people on a meat based
    19        diet."
 
    20        My Lord, if that box (as your Lordship may conclude it
              does) implies or suggests that the person who goes and
    21        eats a McDonald's meal is likely to be poisoned by some
              kind of organism such as E-coli or salmonella, or is
    22        likely to be damaged by hormones or antibiotics in the
              meat, then again it is false.
    23
              We come now to employment.  Heading:  "What is it like
    24        working for McDonald's?  There must be a serious problem:
              even though  80% of McDonald's workers are part-time, the
    25        annual staff turnover is 60% (in the USA it is 300%).
              It's not unusual for their restaurant-workers to quit 
    26        after just four or five weeks.  The reasons are not hard 
              to find."  My Lord, that, your Lordship may feel, is 
    27        plainly a suggestion that the staff turnover is, for
              reasons which are about to be described in the leaflet, as
    28        high as it is because the working conditions are so poor.
 
    29        Heading:  "No unions allowed.  Workers in catering do
              badly in terms of pay and conditions.  They are at work in
    30        the evenings and at weekends, doing long shifts in hot,
              smelly, noisy environments.  Wages are low and chances of

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