Day 111 - 30 Mar 95 - Page 19
1 pathogen bacteria but may give an indication of the extent
2 to which hygiene controls are working or not working. We
3 have had some evidence about testing for specific
4 pathogenic bacteria like E.Coli and salmonella.
5
6 I do not think there has been any real contest about the
7 general microbiological background, if I can describe it in
8 that way, which is not to stop you asking Ms. Hovi
9 questions about it if she said something to you which makes
10 you think that there is a relevant gap in our general state
11 of knowledge about it but, otherwise, one can describe that
12 always common ground in the general microbiological
13 background which is the general springboard for you to
14 elicit from Ms. Hovi such evidence as you wish to adduce
15 about practices or non-practices at Jarrett, which you may
16 wish to argue at the end of the day to me, give rise to a
17 greater risk of food poisoning of those who being served in
18 McDonald's happen to eat meat which came from Jarretts to
19 McKey and then on to McDonald's at least if it was not
20 properly cooked before being served to McDonald's
21 customers.
22
23 I hope that is a fair, global view of the situation.
24
25 MR. MORRIS: Yes.
26
27 MR. JUSTICE BELL: You have already put Ms. Hovi's statement in.
28 I have read it several times. I read it again just before
29 I came into this court this morning. Even though it may
30 cover ground we have covered before, if you wanted to ask
31 her, going through each of the things which she has
32 enumerated under paragraph 6, which you consider to be
33 still alive, and each of the things which are enumerated
34 under paragraph 7, how, if at all, Ms. Hovi thinks that
35 leads to a risk of food poisoning and what her view of the
36 extent of the risk is, then please do so, but I suggest
37 that is what you want to ask.
38
39 If I can give an example: You could say to her: "In
40 paragraph 6, part 3, you say that the boning temperatures
41 of the meat in the boning hall at Alec Jarrett were, as a
42 rule, well above 7 degrees Centigrade". Ms. Hovi has now
43 expanded on that to say that when she took temperatures of
44 the carcasses before they either went off as whole
45 carcasses, or went into the boning room to be deboned, they
46 were often -- I am not purporting to be word perfect now --
47 but the effect of it was they were often above 7 degrees
48 Centigrade. You can ask her: "Well, what do you make of
49 that from a health point of view?"
50
51 Just as an example, under 7 you could say: "You say under
52 7, the fourth item, throughout the plant there was a
53 shortage of facilities for disinfection of hand tools and
54 knives", with or without reference to the plan, you could
55 ask her to say: "What do you mean by 'a shortage'? What
56 should there have been which there was not?" Again, you
57 can say: "And what are the implications of that, in your
58 view, so far as food safety is concerned?"
59
60 Although Ms. Hovi is your witness, I suggest that that
