Day 132 - 07 Jun 95 - Page 43


     
     1        mine.
     2
     3   Q.   Or you could safely rubbish them as you have done in your
     4        statement?
     5        A.  I do not believe I have rubbished them.  I have been
     6        asked to comment on their statements and I have done so.
     7        I do not see it as "rubbishing".
     8
     9   Q.   But as somebody who has, clearly, got a commitment to
    10        working with McDonald's, should we then rubbish your
    11        evidence?
    12        A.  I have a commitment to making all my companies safer
    13        places.  That is the end of story.  You must make of my
    14        evidence what you wish.
    15
    16   Q.   You said that if employees have a grievance about safety
    17        they should go to their local Environmental Health Officer?
    18        A.  Indeed, if they feel it has not been responded to
    19        properly.
    20
    21   Q.   Do you know that McDonald's has a provision in their Crew
    22        Handbook which every crew member is expected to read, that
    23         -- I do not want to get it wrong -- going to an outside
    24        organisation to tell of conditions, in-store conditions, is
    25        a sackable offence?
    26        A.  I do not see an Environmental Health department as an
    27        outside organisation.  I am sorry.  I do not know what they
    28        mean by that and I have not seen the document before.
    29
    30   Q.   It is hardly an inside organisation, is it?
    31        A.  No, it is not, but I would not regard it as a sackable
    32        offence.  You would have to ask where on the Environmental
    33        Health letter that we saw, where the EHO said that several
    34        members had complained to him that they had been burned,
    35        you would have to ask whether they have been sacked for
    36        reporting that; I see no evidence to say they have been.
    37
    38   Q.   The point is that it would take a lot of courage for any
    39        McDonald's workers to report about in-store conditions to
    40        an outside organisation knowing that it is a sackable
    41        offence at McDonald's, would it not?
    42        A.  If they cared to phone the Environmental Health
    43        Department and say they would prefer that their name was
    44        not revealed, an Environmental Health Officer would not do
    45        so.  The whole point is that McDonald's internal system
    46        should take care of such complaints themselves and any
    47        responsible company tries to structure themselves so to do.
    48
    49   Q.   When you have talked to McDonald's employees which,
    50        I presume, you have from time to time? 
    51        A.  Yes. 
    52 
    53   Q.   I will ask that question in a different way:  When you have
    54        talked to employees, that would be part of a specific job
    55        that you were doing, would it, you would be asked to go and
    56        speak to someone or what?
    57        A.  I would speak to employees when I have been walking
    58        around a store, when I have been looking at particular
    59        tasks, specifically when we have been doing risk assessment
    60        exercises and so on, which I include as part of their

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