Day 116 - 26 Apr 95 - Page 24


     
     1        have concerned me sufficiently to make enquiries.
     2
     3   Q.   Is there any way using this system in which the Store
     4        Manager can massage his figures so as to disguise the
     5        number of under age, let us say, under 18s, working at what
     6        you would call excessive hours?
     7        A.  I would say it was impossible.
     8
     9   Q.   Impossible?
    10        A.  Yes.
    11
    12   Q.   When this system was first in place was it before or after
    13        the law changed?
    14        A.  Before.
    15
    16   Q.   So it was started at a time when the maximum you could work
    17        in a week was 48 hours?
    18        A.  If you were under 18.
    19
    20   Q.   I mean if you were under 18.
    21        A.  Yes.
    22
    23   Q.   Do you remember in your time -- you started I think you
    24        told us in October '82 -- any prosecutions either ---
    25        A.  October 1984.
    26
    27   Q.   -- hang on, what?
    28        A.  October '84.
    29
    30   Q.   Sorry,'84, did I say '82?
    31        A.  Yes.
    32
    33   Q.   Apologies.  1984.  In your time, 1984 to 1991, when you
    34        went off sick, any prosecutions either under this
    35        provision, that is to say, under 18s working more than 48
    36        hours a week, or under the provisions which prohibited
    37        employment of people younger than school leaving age, do
    38        you remember any prosecutions during that period?
    39        A.  None whatever.
    40
    41   Q.   You know there were some before you took over?
    42        A.  Yes, indeed.
    43
    44   Q.   Two in 1982, I think, one at the beginning of October 1984?
    45        A.  That is right.
    46
    47   Q.   Have there been, so far as you are aware, any such
    48        prosecutions since you stopped being Head of Personnel in
    49        1991?
    50        A.  Not that I know of. 
    51 
    52   Q.   Do you have a function within McDonald's for keeping an eye 
    53        on litigious matters?
    54        A.  I did until I became Ombudsman -- for instance, this
    55        case.
    56
    57   Q.   Sticking with this bundle XII, can I ask you to turn on,
    58        please, to tab 51B which is right at the back?  It is the
    59        last item.  I am moving now, Mr. Nicholson, from 16 and 17
    60        year-olds to people younger than that, children under

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