Day 263 - 14 Jun 96 - Page 14
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2 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It may well be -- I do not know -- that the
3 rationale of the General Accident case is that you would be
4 entitled to other notes and reports in relation to those
5 meetings, because it is only fair that you should have
6 them, but the balance of fairness would fall against you
7 when it comes to actual witness statements, or something of
8 that kind. Happily, it seems that I am not going to have
9 to decide that, because they are not there. You are not
10 asking for them -- perfectly sensibly, it seems to me --
11 because the notes and or reports should be good enough for
12 your purposes, and Mr. Rampton says there are not any,
13 anyway.
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15 MS. STEEL: Yes. I mean, I had thought of some differences
16 between them.
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18 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That is just to put your mind at rest, that
19 that is what I was on about.
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21 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
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23 MS. STEEL: I had actually thought of some -- there was some
24 kind of deference between them, which I would deal. But
25 seeing as we are not applying for statements, I will not.
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27 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If I had been put to it, part of the problem
28 would have been to specify what the difference was between
29 them, if I wanted you to have one but not the other.
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31 MS. STEEL: But you do not want us to do that?
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33 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No.
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35 MS. STEEL: OK.
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37 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Well, I do not want you to do it if (a) you
38 are not asking for them and (b) Mr. Rampton says there are
39 not any -- and I have no reason to doubt what he says.
40 Some other judge can grapple with that some other day.
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42 MS. STEEL: Right, OK. I will just check what other things I
43 need to cover. (Pause) Just on the point I was on
44 slightly before, I mean, the Plaintiffs have asserted that
45 we are core members of the group; and, obviously, in terms
46 of whether or not that is the case, the entire records of
47 the meetings which agents attended would be relevant to
48 that picture and throw light on that picture. One thing I
49 see is that I cannot see -- well, it did not seem that the
50 Plaintiffs have pleaded how their agency argument works, in
51 terms of whether it is through mere attendance, through
52 being in charge or through taking part in anti-McDonald's
53 discussions, or what. So that seems to be up in the air.
54 We do not know what Mr. Rampton is going to argue at the
55 day, and there may very well be relevant material in terms
56 of any of those things within the rest of the notes.
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58 One thing was suggested, that by Mr. Rampton saying that
59 there was nothing going on at those meetings of relevance,
60 in effect, he is giving evidence about what happened on
