Day 088 - 13 Feb 95 - Page 11

     
     1        chilled and there are on through the factory as the process
     2        takes place.
     3
     4   Q.   Will you test it, for example, at the deboning stage?
     5        A.  Yes, we will.
     6
     7   Q.   Tell me something, if you will, apart from McKey, without
     8        infringing any commercial confidence unless we have to, do
     9        your customers come and monitor your activities for
    10        hygiene?
    11        A.  Yes.
    12
    13   Q.   Do they all do it?
    14        A.  Yes -- no, all our British customers do.
    15
    16   Q.   Yes.  Do McKey's visit your premises?
    17        A.  Yes, they do.
    18
    19   Q.   About how often?
    20        A.  I would say that the McKey audit team come roughly
         twice a year, but when one looks at the McKey situation
    22        they have more than one factory, they have three factories
    23        which we supply so we can be subject to six inspections.
    24
    25   Q.   When they come, do they announce they are coming or do they
    26        just turn up?
    27        A.  No, on the audit procedure, yes, it is a prearranged
    28        meeting because what they do to come and inspect our
    29        factory is actually to inspect our total auditing that we
    30        take place daily and the records that we keep under the
    31        Food Act because our British Food Act is the most stringent
    32        in the world now, and because we have to keep records by
    33        law, they can inspect that.  At the same time they will
    34        inspect the factory, of course.
    35
    36        If I may just go on, sir, I just have one other thing to
    37        say on that, we are subject to spot inspections without any
    38        prior appointment by our retailers to which, I believe,
    39        McKey Services as well.
    40
    Q.   So far as McKey's are concerned, do you have what one might
    42        call an "open book policy"?
    43        A.  Oh, yes, well, not to our profit, sir.
    44
    45   Q.   Oh, no, no, I meant your microbiological tests, your
    46        procedures and so on and so forth?
    47        A.  Yes.
    48
    49   Q.   Would you show any of your other retail customers documents
    50        which concern your business with McKey's? 
    51        A.  No, we would not. 
    52 
    53   Q.   Would you show McKey's people your Sainsbury or your Tesco
    54        documents?
    55        A.  No, we would not.
    56
    57   Q.   Can we deal, as I said first, with hygiene?  I will take
    58        it, if I may, from the point of arrival at the
    59        slaughterhouse but only briefly.  Do you have a problem, as
    60        one sometimes, it seems, one does with cattle, of pigs