Day 259 - 10 Jun 96 - Page 70


     
     1        dutifully -----
     2
     3   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Well, that is my ruling.
     4
     5   MR. RAMPTON:  If that is your Lordship's ruling, I dutifully
     6        obey.  I will say this, though: so far as other dates when
     7        the inquiry agents attended meetings -- according to the
     8        criteria that I have used for relevance -- so far as other
     9        dates are concerned which it is not intended that they
    10        should make any reference to in evidence, so that the
    11        information relating to those other dates which is nothing
    12        to do with McDonald's or the Defendants directly, so far as
    13        those dates are concerned, they have not been deployed in
    14        evidence.  Therefore, if we are right about the law of
    15        privilege, those documents remain privileged.
    16
    17   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I can see there might be an argument about
    18        that, but I will have to hear it in due course. If there is
    19        some reason to suppose that they have not actually been
    20        deployed in evidence in the statements of the witnesses
    21        which I assume you are going to put in as their
    22        evidence-in-chief, there may be something material there;
    23        then there may be an argument -- I think style and
    24        Style and Hollander calls it the cherry picking principle
    25        -- in relation to waiver.
    26
    27   MR. RAMPTON:  I would accept that that was an argument to be
    28        had.  But where (a) they are not to be deployed in evidence
    29        and (b) they contain nothing relating directly to the
    30        Defendants or to McDonald's, then I decline to disclose
    31        them.
    32
    33   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It may well be -- and I am specifically
    34        reserving this ruling to the notes of 17th May -- it may
    35        well mean that I will need some persuasion, as I have been
    36        persuaded in this case or, rather, persuaded myself in this
    37        case, that there is some potential relevance which does
    38        merit discovery.
    39
    40   MR. MORRIS:  Another example which we were going to bring up at
    41        a submission, that the meetings attended by Frances Tiller
    42        and Michelle Hooker on behalf of the Plaintiffs, although
    43        they are our witnesses -- sorry, Frances Tiller is our
    44        witness -- their notes must be relevant.
    45
    46   MS. STEEL:   Of the meetings which are already in evidence or in
    47        issue.
    48
    49   MR. MORRIS:  Or even other meetings.  But, yes, the point is
    50        that the notes that they made must be relevant, and then we 
    51        get on to the argument of privilege. 
    52 
    53   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Who has those notes?
    54
    55   MR. MORRIS:  They were given to the Plaintiffs.
    56
    57   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Do you know that the Plaintiffs have those
    58        notes?
    59
    60   MR. RAMPTON:  No, the Defendants do not know that the Plaintiffs

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