Day 053 - 22 Nov 94 - Page 21
1
2 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, Mr. Crawford, on the second page. When
3 he got to his second statement, he concluded it, after the
4 argument about a common denominator, by saying on
5 page 10: "If you accept the link between heart disease,
6 high fat diets and particularly high saturated fat diets"
7 -- and, obviously, from what I just read out, that was a
8 close and causal link, apart from anything else -- "then it
9 is difficult to escape the conclusion that a similar link
10 exists between cancer and foods rich in fat, particularly
11 saturated fats and N-3 fatty acids, particularly DHA and
12 the appropriate antioxidants."
13
14 Then he has a further paragraph. Then, in addition to
15 that, you have adduced evidence -- whether of your own
16 initiative or by cross-examination -- which is designed to
17 point to the fact, as you have, that a number of people eat
18 quite enough McDonald's food for it to affect their diet by
19 making it high in fat and saturated fat -- Grazing in
20 Peckham, certain other surveys, the cross-examinations and
21 calculations about how difficult or otherwise it is to keep
22 your diet within governmental recommendations if you eat so
23 many McDonald's meals a week, and so on.
24
25 So I hope I can be forgiven for thinking that, whether or
26 not you would be content with less at the end of the day,
27 you were seeking to establish, however directly or
28 indirectly, a causal link between eating McDonald's food,
29 which means eating McDonald's meals, and these adverse
30 matters -- maybe just by contribution to the diet, but a
31 causal link, nevertheless.
32
33 MS. STEEL: With respect, no. I mean, I know for a fact that we
34 asked our witnesses about the links between diet and heart
35 disease and cancer. We did not ask them specifically
36 about "cause". Some of them have mentioned "cause"
37 because, presumably, that was one type of link which they
38 considered was relevant.
39
40 But we would have approached the whole area in an entirely
41 different way had the pleadings read "caused". We would
42 not have bothered with all the stuff about statistical
43 associations, and things like that. We would have just
44 focused our whole attention on "cause". So there would
45 have been a great deal more evidence in relation
46 to "cause"; and in terms of cross-examining witnesses --
47 and, I think, in particular, Mr. Wheelock -- we would have
48 gone into a great deal more questions about what he meant
49 by "linked" and things like that, if we had realised that
50 it was only a causal link that mattered. As far as we were
51 concerned, when he agreed to -----
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53 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Forget "only a causal link that mattered";
54 are you saying that you did not even appreciate that the
55 question of a causal link might matter?
56
57 MS. STEEL: Not in itself, no, only in terms of that if we did
58 show a causal link, that was one type of link, so that
59 would help us or that you would win the case, but not in
60 terms of we had to show a causal link.
