Day 127 - 23 May 95 - Page 23
1 assessment then.
2
3 We could see that there was a potential that it could kill
4 and we wanted them to be made very aware of that. Part of
5 the problem is that -- I am just the same as anybody else;
6 "It's not going to happen to me", and therefore we wanted
7 to make the message as strong as possible to try to get
8 that over.
9
10 Q. Did you make any changes, whether for your own reasons or
11 in consequence of the new regulations, in the rules, your
12 Company rules, about who was allowed to do electrical work
13 in any part of the Company's property?
14 A. Well, we certainly went into more detail about what the
15 policy was. I believe it was actually June 1992 before
16 this was inserted into the Health and Safety policy, but we
17 specified that unless people had been on the advanced
18 equipment course they were not to carry out any equipment
19 repairs ---
20
21 Q. Sorry.
22 A. -- part of that course included training, further
23 training, of the dangers of electricity. We also put into
24 place a training seminar for all managers and supervisors
25 that was rolled out throughout the country, throughout 1991
26 and early 1992, where every restaurant manager and
27 supervisor was personally addressed in terms of the dangers
28 of electricity and what the new regulations meant.
29
30 Q. That we see in paragraph 3, do we not, Mrs. Barnes, which
31 has been underlined by you?
32 A. That is correct.
33
34 Q. Then it says this: "Regional Training departments will
35 arrange for maintenance men to attend an AEC if required,
36 the maintenance person's job description has been changed
37 to exclude", which is underlined, "small equipment repair.
38 Please delete small equipment repair from the duties
39 section of any maintenance person's job descriptions you
40 might have in your restaurant e.g. in the crew training
41 programme. Small equipment repair is now an optional duty
42 to the maintenance men, i.e. to be carried out only if an
43 AEC has been completed". So had it been the position
44 before that the maintenance person could have done small
45 electrical jobs even if he had not done the AEC?
46 A. That is correct. In many cases, of course, these
47 maintenance men were probably ex-electricians who had
48 retired and had come to work for the restaurant. But we
49 felt, even if that were so, we still need to specify
50 internal training for them.
51
52 Q. Do you know yourself how long it takes to get a
53 professional qualification as a practical electrician?
54 A. I believe it is several years.
55
56 Q. Over the page, Mrs. Barnes, 720, "NB", you say: "The AEC
57 has been revised and from now on will include tuition on
58 electrical safety". Up to this date had it not done so?
59 A. It did mention electricity but we did not feel that the
60 information was in enough detail. You certainly could not
