Day 259 - 10 Jun 96 - Page 20

     
     1
     2   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Why do you not try and ask some questions and
     3        see where we get to?
     4
     5   MS. STEEL:   (To the witness)  Well, in your affidavit on
     6        page 9, you say in the middle paragraph:
     7
     8        "Unless a specific problem arose regarding clock cards,
     9        e.g. they became evidence in an industrial tribunal
    10        application, they would be destroyed by the restaurant
    11        shortly after the fortnight period expired."
    12
    13        In this Personnel, Policies and Procedures Manual, it says
    14        under the section on page 30, retention of records:
    15
    16        "The following details how long records should be retained
    17        and time cards is three years."
    18
    19        Do you want to see it?  You can check it.
    20        A.  No.  I take your word for it.
    21
    22   Q.   Have you got any explanation for why you should say
    23        something different in your affidavit?
    24        A.  Because I was probably talking about a period before
    25        1991.
    26
    27   Q.   Your affidavit does not say that the situation has
    28        changed.  It just implies that no clock cards are kept
    29        longer than about two weeks unless they are evidence in
    30        something?
    31        A.  I think you will find in most restaurants that is the
    32        case.   They do not have the capacity.
    33
    34   Q.   So all restaurants are ignoring the Personnel, Policies and
    35        Procedures Manual?
    36        A.  Unless that policies and procedures manual began in
    37        1991, unless it a new procedure begun in 1991.  But
    38        restaurants simply do not have the capacity for storing
    39        clock cards in that kind of numbers.
    40
    Q.   So, your Personnel, Policies and Procedures Manual is just
    42        an irrelevant document that nobody should bother taking any
    43        notice of?
    44        A.  No.  In 1991, I moved on from personnel, and perhaps
    45        whoever was then heading the personnel department rewrote
    46        the thing and came up with a new instruction.  I cannot
    47        remember any instructions regarding the length we had to
    48        keep clock cards.  My personal inquiries made of
    49        restaurants led me to understand that they did not keep
    50        them; they did not have the capacity to keep clock cards 
    51        once they had been used and the information had been 
    52        extracted. 
    53
    54   Q.   Then, on page 12 of your affidavit, you say, in the second
    55        paragraph:
    56
    57        "There is no company policy with regard to the retention
    58        of accident report books and incident report forms.
    59        However, there is a legal requirement for the accident
    60        report books to be kept for three years following the date