Day 246 - 09 May 96 - Page 30
1 being put to you is this: Granted that you wanted to
2 explain in the face of criticism from either the Defendants
3 themselves, or those who were supporters of theirs, why
4 McDonald's were suing them; granted that you wanted to say
5 that what was in the leaflet was inaccurate or untrue. Why
6 actually say that it was lies -- just pause a moment --
7 bearing in mind that your definition of a lie yesterday was
8 "something which is untrue and known by the giver of the
9 information to be untrue"?
10 A. Yes, sir.
11
12 Q. Why take that further step? Why not just say: "We are
13 taking this action to clear our name in the face of
14 allegations about our policies and practices which are not
15 accurate"? It may be dressed up in better PR language than
16 that but why say "lies"?
17 A. I did not select the words, and it could have been done
18 that way. However, I do firmly believe they knew, the
19 Defendants, that what was in that leaflet was not true.
20
21 Why do I say that, sir? In the face of people like the
22 BBC 2, The Guardian or The Scotsman apologising to us on
23 the rainforest issue, that, having had quite wide
24 circulation, it is just inconceivable to me that someone
25 who even today asserts the 100 per cent truthfulness of
26 every word in the leaflet could have ignored the entity
27 such as that apologising. I have no power, no strength
28 over those people. When they were presented the facts in
29 the matter, they apologised.
30
31 In this case, I would have hoped and probably thought, the
32 Defendants having seen what others had done, might realise
33 that we quite possibly have it wrong yet they continued to
34 go forward even today asserting that everything in those
35 leaflets is 100 per cent truthful.
36
37 I do say to you, and I say so quite sincerely, I do not
38 know if I had written the document I would have used those
39 words but I do believe they knew what was in there was
40 incorrect.
41
42 MR. MORRIS: You brought up the fact that you are claiming that
43 because BBC 2, for example, and The Guardian made an
44 apology rather than fight a court case, anybody in the
45 world who puts over similar criticisms must be lying and
46 that is the basis for your belief in that critics must be
47 lying because some others have apologised in open court; is
48 that correct?
49 A. Mr. Morris, that is not what I said. I said in the
50 face of entities such as this, who have a fine reputation,
51 they having been given the McDonald's story, I assume
52 having made some inquiries of their own, chose to say: "We
53 got it wrong". At the very least I would have thought that
54 you would have re-examined that which you say with a view
55 towards: "Maybe, just maybe, we got it wrong".
56
57 Q. Right. OK. I would accept that we have had a chance to
58 examine. That is why we called 70 witnesses.
59
60 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I am sorry, this is just turning into an
