Day 083 - 06 Feb 95 - Page 44
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2 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
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4 MR. MORRIS: So, should I suspend my submission then on this?
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6 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes, I think so. I think what you should do
7 is look again at what Lord Justice Neill said because he
8 laid down the test for what you can plead. Then look at
9 what evidence or information you have which will enable
10 you, or so you would argue, to plead anything in relation
11 to Brazil, applying Lord Justice Neill's test. Then, in
12 due course, you can put it in front of me and I will either
13 give you leave to amend or I will not. If I give you leave
14 to amend, it will be in the form you have put forward or
15 some modified form. The Plaintiffs may ask for particulars
16 of it. If they do, I will consider that. Then when we
17 know where we are on the pleadings, you can make any
18 application you wish for discovery.
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20 I do not think you suffer by not asking Dr. Gomez
21 Gonzales -- if you want to ask Dr. Gomez Gonzalez about it,
22 then that is a point in favour of sorting it all out before
23 he comes into the witness box, but I do not think you do,
24 quite frankly. You need to have sorted out what case you
25 are putting, i.e. what case you wish to plead with regard
26 to Brazilian beef before Mr. Cesca comes over -- well
27 before Mr. Cesca comes over.
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29 MR. MORRIS: Yes.
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31 MR. JUSTICE BELL: When you do come back to it, I ask you to
32 make a note (and remind me in case I forget) to refer me to
33 those parts of your environmental tab 1 witnesses who would
34 say even 80 tonnes from a non-rainforest area has its
35 effect for this reason or that reason, which is a point you
36 have raised because of what I said on 20th December which
37 you want to say is not right in the light of what your
38 potential witnesses would say.
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40 MR. MORRIS: May I just say one point which I thought was
41 important, but I will not go into depth into it, but just
42 Dr. Gomez Gonzales did say that, effectively, the policy on
43 ex-rainforest land within a country such as Brazil, because
44 obviously we are focusing on, would be not to have an
45 impact after operations began in that country. So, in
46 fact, effectively, when McDonald's started in Brazil and
47 for a number of years they would have been using land, some
48 of which may have been destroyed five years previously from
49 when they started.
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51 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Right. Get your thought in order about
52 that. Remember the fact that you have not got a policy
53 against something is not necessarily any evidence that you
54 have ever done it.
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56 MR. MORRIS: Do we want to deal with Costa Rica, Guatemala and
57 USA supply sources now or do we move on from this
58 document?
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60 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, if you say there is discovery which
