Speeches by Dollimore.

“You earn around five times what the Prime Minister earns, and you think it is okay to evade media scrutiny when there is a major crisis happening in your company. Do you think people would think it was acceptable if the Prime Minister just went missing during a major crisis and did not want to speak to the media?”

“So, in future you will make yourself available to the media during incidents—yes or no?”

“So, no.”

“You talked about how you have a very responsible and accountable role, which is what justifies the £800,000 pay packet, but you did not face the media when a major incident was unfolding, and you left that to your lower team members. Is that really showing leadership?”

“But you could not spend five minutes speaking to the BBC or ITV?”

“The BBC and ITV were in Brixham, but you could not take five minutes to speak to them?”

“You earn around five times what the Prime Minister earns, and you think it is okay to evade media scrutiny when there is a major crisis happening in your company. Do you think people would think it was acceptable if the Prime Minister just went missing during a major crisis and did not want to speak to the media?”

“So, in future you will make yourself available to the media during incidents—yes or no?”

“So, no.”

“Have you faced the local regional media since the incident?”

“No?”

“If you have future incidents of this nature, will you commit to speaking to the local media during the incident to give reassurance to customers who are scared about how they drink water?”

“We are looking at that closely as a Committee. We saw some of that happening last week in Dover. I know that we are looking at that very closely.”

“My questions are focusing on biosecurity, but I am conscious that some of this has been touched on in earlier questions and we are short on time. I wanted to pick up on a point that Jayne was referencing. Sally, you were earlier talking about how there are holes in this system that are weak points for biosecurity. When…”

“But you thought it was appropriate to take that dividend at a time when people had ended up in hospital after your company’s failings?”

“You did not take your annual bonus, but you added extra to your pay.”

“You could have turned it down.”

“I am conscious of time because we have a lot of Members who want to come in as well, but we have just talked through a very specific failing with very serious consequences for customers. You took a decision weeks later to take a £300,000 increase in your pay package following such a failure. How do you explain that?”

“You accept therefore that your procedures failed in this case, people got sick as a result, and you apologise to those people who ended up sick?”

“You have just outlined a lot of detail around the testing procedure but what seems to be the clearest takeaway from that is that your testing procedures failed, because the HSA told you there was cryptosporidium; you did your own version of testing and thought there was not; and you left it too long and then issued the…”