Day 309 - 03 Dec 96 - Page 26
1 MR. JUSTICE BELL: My question is: why miss out chicken; why not
2 just say food products?
3
4 MR. RAMPTON: I do not know. If I may say so -----
5
6 MR. JUSTICE BELL: The suggested meaning which I have just read
7 out from a note of my own might be thought to be the same
8 as (K) and (M) taken together.
9
10 MR. RAMPTON: That is right. I was just going to say that.
11
12 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Except for the omission of chicken or
13 non-hamburger products.
14
15 MR. RAMPTON: It can only have been a slip of the pen. It must
16 be a slip of the pen, simply because (K), if there were an
17 intention to exclude chickens because of some fear about
18 salmonella cases, then (K) would not have been worded in
19 the way that it is. They must obviously be read together,
20 those two.
21
22 MR. JUSTICE BELL: So, it is not an advised choice because you
23 seek in any way to exclude from the forum evidence about
24 the possible adverse effects, of eating chicken meat, or
25 anything of that kind?
26
27 MR. RAMPTON: Anyway, although that is a slip of the pen, the
28 person who pleaded this is a very experienced defamation
29 practitioner, and he knew perfectly well that he could not
30 exclude chickens unless he made an admission, just by
31 referring to hamburgers, particularly at (K).
32
33 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Chicken comes in, very obviously, even though
34 only "hamburger" is referred to.
35
36 MR. RAMPTON: It walks straight in through the door of
37 justification of the sting. Unless, as I say, a timely
38 admission had been made that chicken is a very risky thing
39 to eat in a restaurant, it would come in anyway. Children
40 eat more chicken than hamburgers, I would guess.
41
42 MR. JUSTICE BELL: So, if the situation at the end of the day is
43 that the Defendants could not justify the sting of any
44 defamatory statement in respect of food poisoning, via the
45 hamburger route, but they could via the chicken route, that
46 would be good enough.
47
48 MR. RAMPTON: I would say that it would be a substantial
49 justification, yes. If they met your Lordship's meaning
50 via the route of chicken or hamburgers -- it would not
51 matter which, really -- then I would accept that that was
52 very nearly true.
53
54 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That is another way of expressing
55 justification in substance and fact, is it -- very nearly
56 true?
57
58 MR. RAMPTON: Yes. That is exactly why those old words were
59 used, because there had developed at one time, towards the
60 end of the 18th Century, beginning of the 19th, a tendency
