Day 214 - 01 02 96 - Page 5

 
 

                                                                  DAY 214
 
                                                 DAVID ROBERTS, Examined:
 
 
 
     1   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Just pause there.  Yes?
     2
     3   MR. RAMPTON:  Can I first ask you this?  Looking at those
     4        different recruitment methods, which is, in your
     5        experience, the most efficient, the most effective?
     6        A.  The most efficient and effective method was the friends
     7        of the existing crew.
     8
     9   Q.   Roughly what percentage of the recruitment was constituted
    10        by word of mouth like that?
    11        A.  At that time -- in the first month, it would be 50 per
    12        cent, between 40 and 50 per cent, but as time went on in
    13        the following months, that was, you know, round about 70
    14        per cent of people we hired were from existing people,
    15        brothers, sisters, friends.
    16
    17   Q.   Did you offer the existing crew any kind of incentive to
    18        recruit their relatives and friends?
    19        A.  Yes, we did.  We have a probationary performance review
    20        after three weeks.  They had to pass that, and then their
    21        next performance review which would be three months later.
    22        If they achieved a good mark on that, then we would give
    23        them £20 bonus.
    24
    25   Q.   If they brought somebody in?
    26        A.  If they brought somebody in, yes.
    27
    28   Q.   Did that depend on the new person doing his probation and
    29        then staying on?
    30        A.  Yes.  They had to stay on for their next performance
    31        review as well.
    32
    33   Q.   So you could not get hold of people coming for three weeks
    34        and then leaving and the other crew member taking the £20
    35        and then splitting it with the chap -----
    36        A.  They would not -- after the three months, if they had
    37        passed, if they got a good mark in that performance review,
    38        obviously by then they enjoyed the job and we found that
    39        everybody stayed on anyway.
    40
    41   Q.   First, are these recruiting methods that you have used
    42        before?
    43        A.  Yes, they are, yes.
    44
    45   Q.   Then I want to ask you, by the time you left in July or
    46        August 1995, what was the actual level on the payroll?
    47        A.  We had 170 crew.
    48
    49   Q.   When I talk about the actual level, I mean people who
    50        worked regularly ----- 
    51        A.  It was 170 people who were actually working. 
    52 
    53   Q.   You have looked at the payroll sheets, have you, for the
    54        whole of the period that we have got them?
    55        A.  Yes, that is correct.
    56
    57   Q.   We saw yesterday -- I am not asking you to look at them now
    58        -- there was a time before you arrived, in particular,
    59        where one notices whole rows of zeros, and they go on for
    60        quite a long time.  To what do you attribute that?
 
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