Day 001 - 28 Jun 94 - Page 08
1 here I insert for the purposes of the meaning of the
leaflet, "like McDonald's, in their endless search for
2 more and more profit. It is no exaggeration to say that
when you bite into a Big Mac, you are helping the
3 McDonald's empire to wreck this planet".
4
My Lord, our case is not only is it an exaggeration, it is
5 a complete falsehood.
6 Next heading, here I draw your Lordship's attention to the
headings along the top of the page. The next heading is:
7 "What is so unhealthy about McDonald's food"? One starts
with the heading "McCancer" by the big M on the first
8 page. One runs one's eye across to McDisease and McDeadly
on the next page. One then sees the heading: "What is so
9 unhealthy about McDonald's food?"
10 If one drops down to the bottom of the page one sees a
delightful cartoon of a hamburger with a cow at one end
11 and a person, I suppose, with his head sticking out at the
other. The cow is saying: "If the slaughter house does
12 not get you", the person completes the sentence, "the junk
food will". Then one reads the text on that page:
13
"McDonald's try to show in their 'Nutrition Guide' (which
14 is full of impressive looking but really quite irrelevant
facts & figures) that mass-produced hamburgers, chips,
15 colas, milkshakes, etc., are a useful and nutritious part
of any diet.
16
What they do not make clear is that a diet high in fat,
17 sugar, animal products and salt (sodium), and low in
fibre, vitamins and minerals - which describes an average
18 McDonald's meal" -- and your Lordship will notice
I emphasise the words "diet" and "meal" -- "is linked with
19 cancers of the breast and bowel, and heart disease. This
is accepted medical fact", says the leaflet, "not a cranky
20 theory. Every year in Britain, heart disease alone causes
about 180,000 deaths".
21
My Lord, if the implication of that passage is that the
22 person who eats a McDonald's meal is running a significant
risk or, indeed, any risk at all of giving himself cancer
23 or heart disease or, as the defendants additionally allege
now, diabetes, then, my Lord, it is an entirely false
24 statement.
25 It is also a false statement that it is an accepted
medical fact that there is a causal association between
26 cancer and the consumption of a large amount of saturated
fats or sodium.
27
Next heading: "Fast = junk". Blob: "Even if they like
28 eating them, most people recognise that processed burgers
and synthetic chips, served up in paper and plastic
29 containers" -- my Lord, in passing, McDonald's chips are
not synthetic. They are made from ordinary potatoes --
30 like other chips people cook in their own houses --
"served up in paper and plastic containers, is junk-food.
