Day 094 - 01 Mar 95 - Page 43
1 submission, on this occasion at least, simply not right.
2
3 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If we take it stage by stage, the first thing
4 is for Ms. Steel or Mr. Morris to produce a Civil Evidence
5 Act notice. In this case it would be more than just
6 putting it on. We have allowed a certain degree of
7 informality, but in order to identify just what it is in
8 respect of which they wish to take advantage of Civil
9 Evidence Act provisions, they would have to specify who
10 made the statement and to whom and when, as best as they
11 could at least.
12
13 MR. RAMPTON: One only has to look at an article -----
14
15 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Is there any provision for preventing them
16 from doing that?
17
18 MR. RAMPTON: The first provision which prevents them from doing
19 that is that they are out of time by many, many, many
20 months. That does not stop it happening if your Lordship
21 thinks it right in all the circumstances at this stage of
22 the case that it should happen.
23
24 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I think it is really up to you to decide
25 whether you do it or not. I do not want you to be under
26 any allusions about where it might or might not get to.
27 I will consider it. There is a long way -- there may be a
28 big step between something becoming admissible as evidence
29 because provisions of the Civil Evidence Act and such
30 procedural rules as apply have been complied with, and a
31 judge actually attaching any weight to it.
32
33 I appreciate that that may be a general problem in this
34 case where a number of witnesses are over the seas, but it
35 suffers from the fact that, obviously, it does not have the
36 same punch as someone who goes into the witness box and is
37 cross-examined. Do you remember, that is why I was
38 particularly keen to see if you were going to call
39 Dr. Barnard, for instance, which you had already arranged
40 to do.
41
42 Just again, continuing to think aloud, when it is something
43 which appears in the quotes in a magazine or a newspaper
44 article, it is very difficult to know whether one can
45 attach any weight to it.
46
47 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, there is an even more difficult
48 question. I am not saying I know the answer, but there is
49 a more difficult question. A statement attributed by a
50 journalist to a source, whether identified or not, is in
51 any event double hearsay. It might be if the journalist
52 were called, he would be able to say: "Yes, Mr. X told
53 me" -----
54
55 MS. STEEL: She.
56
57 MR. RAMPTON: Or she, I do not mind -- he or she might be able
58 to say: "Yes, that person said that", but we have not even
59 got past that.
60
