Day 301 - 15 Nov 96 - Page 26

     
     1        two billion dollars profits - he claimed that "people are
     2        paid a wage for the job they do".  And there was a - I have
     3        not got the references here, unfortunately, but you
     4        probably have a note - he had agreed earlier that crew
     5        members worked hard and their job was more physically
     6        demanding then his own.  Therefore, we would say that they
     7        should be paid more than he gets.
     8
     9        And that it is a kind of -- I mean, there was debate about
    10        this at different times during the case, about what you
    11        compare wages to.  I mean, we would say it is low paid by
    12        any comparison to anything, anything realistic that it
    13        could be compared to, and I am coming on to that later, but
    14        there is no reason why more responsibility should mean more
    15        money.
    16
    17        We would say it is just an opinion of people that have more
    18        responsibility, more money and want to keep their position
    19        by justifying -- for example, directors of companies
    20        justify their huge wages on the grounds that they are in a
         position of power and responsibility, but we would say the
    22        important people in any company are the people that do the
    23        work at the bottom and that is our right to have that
    24        opinion.
    25
    26        Then he was asked if he could use the advertising budget to
    27        pay higher wages to the workers, and he said without
    28        advertising the company would have "no business".
    29
    30        I come on to Sid Nicholson.  McDonald's UK vice president
    31        had been a policeman for 31 years, firstly in South Africa,
    32        finishing as a chief superintendent in the Metropolitan
    33        Police in London.  He joined McDonald's as head of security
    34        in 1983 and became head of personnel, I think, in 1984 to
    35        1991, combining the two jobs for most of that period.
    36        There seemed to be a bit of shuffling about.
    37
    38        As far as McDonald's is concerned, head of personnel and
    39        head of security were quite capable of being one and the
    40        same person, which we would say is symbolically significant
         because, in some ways, a company as paranoid as McDonald's,
    42        who are so determined to keep control mechanisms at all
    43        levels, personnel would be seen as a security problem.  Not
    44        security in terms of criminal security or losing money or
    45        anything like that, stealing money, but security in terms
    46        of control.  Personnel are seen as people that have to be
    47        kept under control.
    48
    49        I will not give the references.  I am going to give
    50        references as I go through this.  It will take a bit longer
    51        but it will probably be easier to do it now rather than go
    52        through it again.  I presume all those details you would
    53        have taken notes on at the time, in any event.
    54
    55   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes.
    56
    57   MR. MORRIS:   I am not going to go through the exact wage rates
    58        now, but Mr. Nicholson denied the basic of £3 an hour was
    59        low pay or that the catering industry was low paid compared
    60        to other industries and he did not have any experience of