Day 279 - 12 Jul 96 - Page 24


     
     1   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, if that is position then there is no need
     2        for any reading to be done at this stage.
     3
     4   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  No, I appreciate that.
     5
     6   MR. RAMPTON:  No.  I was going to say something else, in
     7        addition, then there is no need for a Civil Evidence Act
     8        notice, if they are admissions against interest, they are
     9        admissible anyway, if they are admissions by a party.  And
    10        your Lordship can look at them.
    11
    12   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Quite frankly, it seems to me it probably
    13        better if it is Civil Evidence Act, for the simple reason
    14        it avoids an awful lot of argument about what is admissions
    15        against interest and what is not.
    16
    17   MR. RAMPTON:  I quite agree.
    18
    19   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  You did say it was a Civil Evidence Act?  Not
    20        that that matters.
    21
    22   MR. RAMPTON:  No.  Can I just add one thing about what Miss
    23        Steel has just said?  We disclosed the parts which your
    24        Lordship said, looking at the article, were likely to be
    25        the most relevant.  The stuff that is not in there is stuff
    26        which plainly is not relevant.  We had a first go, if your
    27        Lordship remembers, or Mr. Atkinson did, and your Lordship
    28        said, "No, there is another bit of the article", I forget
    29        which bit it was, "which might also be relevant on the
    30        defendant's admissions."  So we disclosed that part as
    31        well.  There is no reason to disclose any other part of
    32        it.
    33
    34             I am only concerned that the proper context should be
    35        before your Lordship, that is all.
    36
    37   MS. STEEL:  That is my concern as well, and obviously I would
    38        not ask you to look at the whole video.  However, I do
    39        think that if the plaintiffs want to rely on the context
    40        they should disclose the whole video to myself and
    41        Mr. Morris, and we can look at it and see whether there is
    42        any comment that we might wish to make about whether or not
    43        they have put the relevant context forward.
    44
    45   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I see no reason to change my previous Ruling,
    46        because it was on the basis of G.C. Capital, which included
    47        in effect not only those parts which are relevant, or
    48        arguably relevant, but the parts which were needed to make
    49        sense of the parts which were relevant.  I have got no
    50        reason to doubt that the bits which have been disclosed do
    51        not cover all of that.  So, I am not going to revise my
    52        earlier Ruling.  Nothing has happened this morning which
    53        would cause me to do that.  The only question now is which,
    54        if any, part should be read out.
    55
    56   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, as your Lordship knows, I am resistant to
    57        this reading stuff, but I have a particular reason in this
    58        particular instance.  The actual video or the relevant
    59        parts of it have already been played in court, and we
    60        really to not want to sit here, I respectfully suggest, and

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