Day 284 - 22 Oct 96 - Page 07


     
     1        You may have an article in a newspaper which says that a
     2        person, a director of a company, is dishonest, that he sold
     3        funds belonging to the company of which he is a director, X
     4        thousand pounds on 1st January and then X thousand pounds
     5        on various other dates, and ends up saying "We think he is
     6        not fit to be a director of any public company".
     7
     8        Insofar as those matters contain general charges which are
     9        said to be charges of fact, that he is a dishonest man and
    10        that he is not fit to run a public company, insofar as
    11        those are said to be general charges of fact, you could
    12        call not only evidence that he did steal money on the dates
    13        alleged, but you could call other matters of fact as to his
    14        conduct of the company which you say justify those general
    15        charges of statement of fact.
    16
    17        Insofar as you said that the statement 'he is not fit to
    18        run a public company' is a comment rather than a statement
    19        of fact, you could only rely on matters which are actually
    20        set out in the article, namely the thefts on the first day
    21        of each month or sufficiently referred to by the article.
    22        In other words, they may not be expressly set out but some
    23        reference is given, which, as I understand it, leads to
    24        that.  Or you could say it is a matter of notorious public
    25        knowledge that this is the situation, and rely upon that.
    26
    27        What you could not say is "We can justify the comment which
    28        we say it is, that he is unfit to run a company by saying,
    29        by proving that he is not only a married man but he has got
    30        six mistresses and he spends most of his time visiting them
    31        rather than looking after the company". I very much doubt
    32        that you could rely upon those as matters of fact which
    33        justified the statement of fact, because certainly so far
    34        as comment is concerned, you are bringing in things which
    35        you have not given the reader the benefit of when he read
    36        the article so that he could form his own view as to
    37        whether the man was fit to run the company or not.
    38
    39        Now, in due course, we will no doubt hear whether --
    40        because these are the sort of things I want to ask
    41        Mr. Rampton about, but I am not going to ask him about
    42        company directors who have mistresses, but I certainly want
    43        to ask him about some of the statements which were made in
    44        this leaflet, and if he says they are statements of fact
    45        and they are general charges, what are you entitled to rely
    46        on in an attempt to justify them, and insofar as he might
    47        say 'Well, that is a matter of comment rather than a
    48        statement of fact', what are you entitled to rely on to
    49        show that it is fair comment.
    50 
    51        But I think you do have to go first on this, and although I 
    52        did not say it in my reasons the other day, one reason I am 
    53        particularly keen to hear you before Mr. Rampton is I know
    54        what he says on behalf of his clients what the meaning of
    55        this leaflet is, as he complains of it on behalf of his
    56        clients.  I do not know in several instances what you and
    57        Miss Steel say the meaning is.
    58
    59        I know what you pleaded as the meaning which you propose to
    60        justify, but large parts of some of those meanings seem to

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