Day 064 - 08 Dec 94 - Page 34

     
     1
     2   Q.   Process plant.  Anyway, you go on in this letter:  "As a
     3        result of this policy", presumably, the -----
     4
     5   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  You say "you", you mean Miss Densmore does.
     6
     7   MR. MORRIS:  Sorry, "you", "McDonald's" I mean.
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     9   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It is McDonald's Corporation, is it not?
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    11   MR. MORRIS:  McDonald's of London, Elizabeth Densmore?
    12        A.  This is Oak Brook.
    13
    14   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It is a carbon copy to someone in McDonald's
    15        in London, but it comes from the gloriously named
    16        McDonald's Plaza ----
    17
    18   MR. MORRIS:  OK.  That is fair enough.  I am sorry about that.
    19        So this is McDonald's "long-standing policy of buying all
    20        our products from suppliers in the host country where we
         are doing business".  Then it says, "designed to increase
    22        the financial stability of the host country and to ...
    23        (reading to the words)... products".  It then says:  "As a
    24        result, we can assure you that the only Brazilian beef used
    25        by McDonald's is that purchased by the six stores located
    26        in Brazil itself."   Then it goes on.  So, what do we make
    27        of all that then?
    28        A.  What is the question?
    29
    30   Q.   If that is the policy, that policy is broken by the use by
    31        McDonald's in the UK of buying Brazilian beef?
    32        A.  That is a statement but what is your question?  I do
    33        not understand your question.
    34
    35   Q.   Having read that now, do you want to make a comment on
    36        where the confusion is?
    37
    38   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Why not just ask in the light of that letter,
    39        in the light what appears in that letter, was the purchase
    40        of Brazilian beef in 1983 (which is the following year) in
         breach of McDonald's policy?
    42        A.  That is your question?
    43
    44   MR. MORRIS:  Yes.
    45        A.  No, as I have said earlier, it was not.  We still
    46        bought the hamburgers locally.  We did not buy the
    47        ingredients locally.  We bought the hamburgers locally.
    48
    49   Q.   It then goes on in the letter just to talk about the
    50        destruction in Brazil in general due to highway 
    51        construction and cattle ranching mainly.  Then if I can 
    52        just note it says in the last paragraph:  "We believe that 
    53        our policy helps to enable its preservation of the
    54        rainforests by restricting demand for exported beef."
    55        Maybe we should leave that.  I put it to you, Mr. Oakley,
    56        that having heard all that that your claimed policies are
    57        worthless or were at that time anyway?
    58        A.  No, that is not correct for the answers I have given
    59        you.
    60