Day 246 - 09 May 96 - Page 47


     
     1   Q.   You have not seen it?
     2        A.  No, I have not.
     3
     4   Q.   Right.  I think I served some extra pages from this, I do
     5        not know if people remember.  I gave the relevant pages to
     6        all parties.  I wonder if it is where it has been put.
     7
     8   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  What is your purpose in putting it to Mr.
     9        Preston?
    10
    11   MR. MORRIS:  I was going to ask him: In general would you accept
    12        the recommendation of a specific governmental committee
    13         ----
    14
    15   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  How can he possibly answer that?
    16
    17   MR. MORRIS:  I do not know.
    18
    19        (To the witness): As a matter of policy, does the
    20        McDonald's Corporation ----
    21
    22   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I would not accept them all.  I would want to
    23        read them and see what I thought of them.  What worries me
    24        about this, I am not suggesting for a moment you mean to be
    25        unfair, but it is clearly quite a thick Report.  It has no
    26        doubt got quite a lot of figures and a bit of science and
    27        everything in it, and to ask a witness who, in any event,
    28        is not an expert in the field to respond to it totally
    29        cold, without having the opportunity to read it through and
    30        deliberate over it, is in fact unfair, no doubt not
    31        intended to be, but is in fact unfair and would mean that I
    32        would probably be able to attach little weight to the
    33        answers.
    34
    35        I am sent week in week out reports of the Law Commission,
    36        Home Office, White Papers on this that and the other.  They
    37        take hours to read, if I can be bothered to do so.
    38        Sometimes I agree with them; sometimes I disagree with
    39        them.  It does not seem to affect Government policy one
    40        bit.  I do not know how Mr. Preston can really offer
    41        anything useful on it.
    42
    43   MR. MORRIS:  (To the witness): I could ask a general question:
    44        Your company presumably takes advice about matters of
    45        expert opinion related to its business practices?
    46        A.  In many fields we take advice, yes.
    47
    48   Q.   Including food safety and hygiene matters?
    49        A.  Yes.
    50 
    51   Q.   In general -- it might be a simple answer "yes" or "no" -- 
    52        but when a specific committee is set up to look at a 
    53        problem such as E.Coli and, if you like, you can look at
    54        the pamphlet to see who is on that committee and
    55        contributed, to make recommendations, does your company
    56        have a policy about whether it follows recommendations, or
    57        whether it just takes its own advice and does not take much
    58        notice of what ----
    59        A.  The people who are involved with the food safety issues
    60        surrounding the incident at Preston and subsequent action

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