Day 286 - 24 Oct 96 - Page 02
1 Thursday, 24th October, 1996
2
3 MR. MORRIS: There is one matter I wanted to clear up from
4 yesterday.
5
6 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
7
8 MR. MORRIS: Which is the references from Robert Beavers'
9 evidence, day 125, pages 36 to 45, I think are the relevant
10 pages, where he said that before the mid 1980s McDonald's
11 had up to 175 burger patty suppliers. And he admitted it
12 was a pretty daunting task - that was on day 125, page 42,
13 line 49 - to police the content and quality of the
14 supplies, agreeing that "cheating was the rule not the
15 exception". Despite only being able to check up on the
16 supply plants less than once every two months, he said -
17 I think from memory he said something like they have a
18 field office, they have to do an enormous range of tasks,
19 and they were lucky to get to the supply plants more than
20 once every two months. McDonald's had discovered cheating
21 by at least 24 of their suppliers who had then been
22 discontinued. That was on page 38, I believe - I can
23 hardly read my writing here - line 59, and page 40, line
24 58.
25
26 Then the impression that was given was that was a major
27 reason for reducing the patty supply down to five companies
28 in the '80s, which seems to have occurred in the early to
29 mid 1980s. I think on top of that he added that their
30 major concern was, for example, fat content and the use of
31 ice to cheat McDonald's in the weight.
32
33 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
34
35 MR. MORRIS: We would say that whether beef supplies were
36 imported or not would have been completely immaterial to
37 McDonald's at that time in terms of any checks that they
38 might have been able to do. What they were concerned with
39 was the quality, meat quality, and being cheated in terms
40 of weight.
41
42 We also heard from Howard Lyman that the only criteria he
43 was informed about, when he was approached for beef
44 supplies to McDonald's, was the fat content of beef.
45
46 I think that deals with that.
47
48 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
49
50 MR. MORRIS: The question is how I move on to present ----
51
52 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It is strictly none of my business, and
53 therefore you must not feel under any pressure to answer me
54 if it embarrasses you in any way at all, but I cannot help
55 noticing that you seem to have page after page of what
56 appears to be typed or word processed matters. You have
57 clearly got highlighting and notes on them, which is
58 understandable. But if you actually have something which
59 you would like to hand me, without prejudice if you decide
60 not to raise something on it, and with a view to
