Day 310 - 04 Dec 96 - Page 17
1 computerised. It is much easier now, obviously. But those
2 regulations went out in the early part of 1987, and it
3 would have been very difficult as a matter of simply
4 practical administration to allocate the right time and
5 eighth, time and a quarter, time and a half to each worker,
6 according to which shift he had worked, and so on and so
7 forth. That is all I mean by that.
8
9 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If you are right that it is on top of the
10 minimum wage, anyway ....
11
12 MR. RAMPTON: Well, it is. There is the minimum wage, then you
13 get time and an eighth, time and a quarter, and if you then
14 work extra hours over 39 you get time and a half for those
15 hours.
16
17 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes. But, as I understand it, you say the
18 proper construction is you do not get time and a quarter on
19 top of what is already an enhanced rate?
20
21 MR. RAMPTON: No.
22
23 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Suppose that is right, what is the
24 difficulty about paying, working out what time and a
25 quarter is on top of what the basic minimum is ---
26
27 MR. RAMPTON: It is just -----
28
29 MR. JUSTICE BELL: -- and paying that if, in fact, it is more
30 than just flat rate with whatever enhancements you have
31 got, whether because of the shift you are working or
32 because you have been given your extra ten, fifteen or
33 twenty pence an hour?
34
35 MR. RAMPTON: It is perfectly true, so far as the enhanced
36 rates are concerned, it presents no difficulty at all
37 because those are automatically included in McDonald's
38 provincial rates; they were exactly the same as the rate
39 regulations. That is no problem. It is when you get to
40 calculating time and a half overtime, I suppose, we might
41 have a difficulty; perhaps I have put it too strongly, to
42 be quite honest.
43
44 MS. STEEL: Can I just ask, I can probably work this out, but I
45 do not actually know what "vasillios", whatever, is?
46
47 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Do not worry about it.
48
49 MR. RAMPTON: That was a silly little Latin joke. I borrowed
50 it from Lord Diplock. It means a little bundle of twigs.
51
52 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
53
54 MR. RAMPTON: A fascist of small stature would be called a
55 (inaudible) stickler, or something.
56
57 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Then on the following page?
58
59 MR. RAMPTON: Yes. (Pause).
60
