Day 079 - 27 Jan 95 - Page 63
1 this part just says that meat is responsible for the
2 majority of cases of food poisoning, and then there is also
3 the part about "at worse poisonous". So it is relevant to
4 how likely it is to happen and all that kind of stuff.
5
6 MR. JUSTICE BELL: But can you answer my question?
7
8 MS. STEEL: There is an incident, the one we were referring to
9 this morning in Michigan for starters.
10
11 MR. JUSTICE BELL: But that is not McKey. You are questioning
12 the Chairman Chief Executive of McKey Food Services.
13
14 MS. STEEL: Well, there is an incident of food poisoning on the
15 Isle of Wight as well. I do not know whether that is
16 E.coli. In the Preston report it does mention that if it
17 is only a mild form of food poisoning it would not
18 necessarily be identified as E.coli even though it could
19 have been caused by that.
20
21 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I understand that. I really think you have
22 so much detail now and you are searching everywhere for a
23 possible loophole. An end has got to come to that search
24 in a way, and then you have your information about that.
25 Then I have to see what might have slipped through the
26 loophole, if it exists. If I see what might have slipped
27 through a loophole that might encourage me to find that
28 there actually was one to slip through. It is a whole
29 parcel of factors and aspects of the evidence. We are
30 spending an awful lot of time searching for the minutia of
31 the way McKey works.
32
33 MR. MORRIS: Part of the problem is that the Plaintiffs raised a
34 defence, well, a defence if you like, to our case.
35 Mr. Walker's statement was very long looking at all parts
36 of the process. Our case has been pretty simple, which is
37 that meat is responsible for X food poisoning incidents and
38 that McDonald's food is at best mediocre and at worst
39 poisonous. The worse case scenario has already happened
40 because of the Preston incident which is admitted. Now we
41 are having to deal ----
42
43 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Let me interrupt you again because you have a
44 witness who has been around McKey's, an expert who has been
45 around McKey's, have you not?
46
47 MR. MORRIS: Yes, but did he not have access to documents.
48
49 MR. JUSTICE BELL: You are not asking about documents. You are
50 asking the processes. He did see those as far as I can
51 understand.
52
53 MR. MORRIS: Yes, but, with respect, he was told a lot of the
54 things but we cannot test that unless we have someone from
55 McKey's.
56
57 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I think you have gone far enough on asking
58 the detail about the processes there. If you have got
59 another matter in the process you want to ask about, let me
60 know what it is because we cannot just go on indefinitely
