Day 147 - 04 Jul 95 - Page 31
1
2 Then I come -- and this is the last I shall say about
3 this -----
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5 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That is entirely up to me, is it not, because
6 no one can force anything on me; and if, at the end of the
7 day, I just felt uncomfortable having something which the
8 Defendants did not have, that is entirely a matter for my
9 personal preference.
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11 MR. RAMPTON: Yes, my Lord, but we would urge, for the reasons
12 I have given, that it was a preference in that direction
13 which we would rather your Lordship did not have -- if
14 I may put it as politely as that. We would much prefer
15 your Lordship had it; not for our sake directly, at all,
16 not because we are trying to put things over on the
17 Defendants.
18
19 That brings me to the closely connected second point; and
20 this is really the nub of it. By what they said just
21 before the adjournment, the Defendants have now, in effect,
22 exposed the true reason why they want these transcripts.
23 Were they to give the undertaking for which we have asked,
24 that would have certain consequences. The first is, of
25 course, that they would have daily access to the transcript
26 for the conduct of the trial. They would have CaseView,
27 but without the disk which enabled them to print out
28 materials for re-publication outside, because I understand
29 that the machine can be emasculated in a way which deprives
30 one of that facility, but still works in court, which is
31 what its principal use is supposed to be.
32
33 If the use of transcripts was confined in the way which we
34 understood it would be when we offered to pay for them in
35 the first place, that would prevent the dissemination of
36 the distorted kinds of reports which the Defendants now
37 admit they have been responsible for. At the same time, it
38 would make no impact on their conduct of the trial, because
39 no undertaking that we sought would prevent their using
40 transcripts for the proper conduct of case. That includes,
41 of course, showing the transcripts, as necessary, to legal
42 advisers for help in the case and, on a limited basis,
43 where witnesses needed to see them, to those witnesses as
44 well.
45
46 What it would prevent (and this is what this is all about)
47 is their disseminating it to, as they have now said,
48 journalists and the McLibel Support campaign and similar
49 like-minded -----
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51 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Can I understand what you are saying then,
52 because, as I understood it just before we adjourned, the
53 undertaking you asked for was that they should not show it
54 or read from it to anyone. I thought that the reason for
55 that might be that you were concerned -- you had better put
56 me right, if this is wrong -- that some of the people who
57 are witnesses or some of the people whom they treat as
58 advisers might do that which you would like to avoid, i.e.,
59 pass it on to other parties altogether.
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