Day 098 - 07 Mar 95 - Page 24

     
     1        possibility that it will increase in temperature, but the
     2        speed at which it moves through is not significant to the
     3        quality of the meat.
     4
     5   Q.   What is the actual temperature in the deboning hall,
     6        generally?
     7        A.  In our deboning hall it is around nine, nine degrees.
     8        I think by law it has to be under 12.
     9
    10   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Shall we have our five-minute break?
    11
    12   MR. MORRIS:  Yes, it would be helpful.
    13
    14                       (Short Adjournment)
    15
    16   MR. MORRIS:  I was going to go to what we could not find
    17        before.  We have found it in the witness bundle.  We have
    18        not got it ourselves.
    19
    20   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Give a reference.
    21
    22   MR. MORRIS:  Defendants Supplementary List, bundle 1, tab 12,
    23        second page.  It is a fax from McDonald's to James Earle.
    24        Just show that to the witness.  I have not got a copy of in
    25        front of me.  Can you read the second paragraph there?
    26        Could you just read out the names of the those
    27        hormones  ---
    28        A.  The antibiotics?
    29
    30   Q.   Yes, antibiotics.
    31        A.  Virginia Mycin, Avo Parcin.
    32
    33   Q.   Are they fairly standard?
    34        A.  I honestly do not know.
    35
    36   Q.   You do not know.  Do you concern yourself at all -- you can
    37        forget that page if you do not know, forget the rest --
    38        then with what the treatment the animals have had or
    39        feedstuffs they eat?
    40        A.  When you say "treatment" do you mean veterinary
         treatment?
    42
    43   Q.   Yes, or whatever?
    44        A.  Yes.
    45
    46   Q.   Or standard antibiotics they may be getting routinely or
    47        anything like that?
    48        A.  Yes, we, as being the operation that we are, we are
    49        subject to the Ministry of Agriculture's screening
    50        programme for residues in meat, and they take thousands of 
    51        samples a month, I think, not necessarily from ourselves, 
    52        but we do have a large proportion of those taken from us 
    53        which go into a, sort of, national screening programme.
    54
    55   Q.   If McDonald's say those antibiotics, Virginia Mycin or Avo
    56        Parcin, are non-hormonal, they are basically only used in
    57        young cattle, i.e. calves, as a proportional effect in
    58        older cattle is uneconomic -- you do not really know about
    59        what happens before cattle get to your plant, is
    60        that  -----