Day 276 - 09 Jul 96 - Page 34
1 The next paragraph, "The group have suggested that
2 McDonald's used spies to infiltrate the group. It is
3 important to note that their meetings were advertised as
4 public meetings, and in order to establish precisely who
5 was responsible for distributing the lies in the leaflet
6 these meetings were indeed attended on McDonald's behalf."
7 The way this is written, the first sentence tries to
8 portray that, you know, literature that has been put out
9 criticising McDonald's is -- you know, it is wrong of it to
10 say that McDonald's used spies to infiltrate the group,
11 whereas that is the reality, which eventually they are sort
12 of forced to admit. But the way it is put...
13
14 Not all the meetings were advertised as public
15 meetings, only the Endsleigh Street meetings were
16 advertised as public meetings and even those were not
17 always advertised. Any way, obviously, Mr. Preston said
18 that it was not to infiltrate the group, but, as we have
19 now seen from the instructions given to the company's
20 inquiry agents, the word infiltrate was exactly the word
21 that was used.
22
23 The next paragraph said, "These two individuals have
24 chosen to defend the leaflet and, contrary to their claims
25 that they are not actively involved, they have, for many
26 years, taken leading roles in a consistent campaign against
27 McDonald's, including responsibility for organising
28 demonstrations and anti-McDonald's fayres." Obviously,
29 well, the first point to make is that what is being
30 referred to here is the statement in the leaflets that just
31 says simply that it is not McDonald's case that the two
32 defendants wrote or printed the leaflet, merely that they
33 distributed it. And I think it said something about -- and
34 in Mr. Morris's case, just that he was present at meetings
35 where it was available.
36
37 Secondly, obviously, we do not have leading roles in a
38 consistent campaign against McDonald's. I mean, obviously,
39 since the writs have been served we have both been
40 determined not to be bullied into silence by McDonald's and
41 so, you know, we have been put in a situation where we have
42 spoken out against McDonald's and campaigned against
43 McDonald's. But, certainly, before the writs were served
44 Mr. Morris had no involvement whatsoever in the
45 anti-McDonald's campaign and I certainly did not have a
46 leading role in it. My only involvement was to take part
47 in pickets which I did not organise, and, as you have
48 already heard, neither of us were organisers of the
49 anti-McDonald's fayres.
50
51 "The group have complained that McDonald's has
52 withheld evidence, McDonald's has complied fully with all
53 obligations to disclose documents." Obviously, this is an
54 area of argument, but to put it quite simply, there have
55 been numerous documents that have been disclosed since the
56 trial has started which were quite obviously in existence a
57 long time ago and in the possession of the Plaintiffs, and
58 documents that we had asked for at the time and they were
59 not forthcoming until, you know, late into the trial. For
60 example, the whole bundle of nutrition documents that were
