Day 152 - 11 Jul 95 - Page 21
1 Q. -- someone for a few weeks?
2 A. I think if we had to hire five to 10 people in any one
3 week, then we would have a very dire situation. I could
4 not think of a reason -- we may require five to 10
5 additional people, but I would be a bit sceptical if we
6 hired 10 people all to start work at the same time.
7 Sceptical -- I suppose just to clarify that -- in a
8 management and crew's ability to look after 10 additional
9 people on one shift.
10
11 Q. So, on average, how many people were you taking on every
12 week at Colchester?
13 A. I would not be able to say every week. I mean, it was
14 my recollection that we may have only had to hire -- gosh,
15 I can certainly say we were not hiring every week. That is
16 for sure. How often, with what frequency, would be more
17 difficult. I would not even probably like to hazard a
18 guess, but it definitely was not every week. I know that
19 for sure.
20
21 Q. I just want to ask about the rap sessions which you
22 conducted, where were they?
23 A. They were generally in the stores, the restaurants of
24 the same Senior Supervisor group, so I think I would have
25 done some in Lowestoft, King's Lynn.
26
27 Q. What, all in ---
28 A. Great Yarmouth.
29
30 Q. -- the East Anglia area?
31 A. I think so.
32
33 Q. When you were taking these rap sessions, did you ever ask
34 crew what they thought about the conditions of employment?
35 A. Absolutely. Part of the layout or the format of the
36 rap session was to go through specific points to ensure
37 that no area was overlooked. Then even to sort of enforce
38 that with asking them if they could change one thing at the
39 restaurant, if they could change things what would they do,
40 as an overall view of it all.
41
42 Q. Did you ever ask them about pay?
43 A. That was one of the areas we had to cover in terms of
44 the format of the rap session, yes.
45
46 Q. Nobody ever complained?
47 A. Nobody ever complained that the pay was too low.
48 People would always like their pay higher, obviously. I
49 would love my salary to be higher but, in general, no.
50
51 Q. So they did say they would like higher pay but you thought,
52 well, that is what everybody says so ---
53 A. Not at all, no.
54
55 Q. -- it is not a particular grievance?
56 A. I have no recollection of somebody giving that
57 example. My recollection is that nobody complained about
58 pay.
59
60 Q. Do you remember conducting rap sessions at the Colchester
