Day 175 - 18 Oct 95 - Page 41


     
     1        and dates, I shall have to make some enquiries about.
     2        Whether I can complete those overnight is obviously very
     3        doubtful.
     4
     5   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I was going to carry on with him in the
     6        morning.
     7
     8   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes.  I thought your Lordship might want to do
     9        that.
    10
    11   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  One factor, it is quite true what you say
    12        about there being matters which are not in the extra notes
    13        I was given, but what troubles me about any substantial
    14        adjournment is the fact is a number of allegations were
    15        made in the original statement and -- it is a word I have
    16        used but I make no apology for using it again -- because
    17        there was no antidote to Mr. Whittle, I am not going to
    18        speculate about why that was, it might have been because
    19        there was no antidote, it might be because you took the
    20        view they are very general allegations and you would leave
    21        them there.  But, however it was, you could have made
    22        enquiries -- for all I know, you did -- to see if there was
    23        someone who was going to come along and say this was a load
    24        of old baloney.
    25
    26   MR. RAMPTON:  Of course, your Lordship, I do not mind saying
    27        that we made quite extensive enquiries and could not find
    28        anybody who even remembered Mr. Whittle.  As I said to your
    29        Lordship earlier, there are no records, no documentary
    30        records.
    31
    32        My Lord, my problem is a rather different one:  Since
    33        Mr. Whittle has volunteered no names, apart from somebody
    34        called Sue, and no precise dates either in his statement,
    35        or in the additional information we were given earlier by
    36        Mr. Morris or in the pieces of paper that we were given at
    37        lunch time, I am going to have to try and extrapolate that
    38        information from him.  If I get some names and some dates
    39        and some occasions, then our position may be a bit
    40        different from what it is now.
    41
    42   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  (To the witness)  Can you come back in the
    43        morning to carry on at 10.30?  It is very much in
    44        everyone's interest that you do so.
    45
    46   THE WITNESS:  Yes.
    47
    48   MS. STEEL:   Can I just say something, that we did ask
    49        Mr. Whittle about names and I think he said something about
    50        first names, but the point is it might be worth Mr. Rampton 
    51        asking those particular questions now because if they are 
    52        not going to be forthcoming it may be that it can all be 
    53        dealt with tomorrow anyway, to save the need for
    54        Mr. Whittle ----
    55
    56   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I am not, at the moment, contemplating going
    57        beyond tomorrow.  If Mr. Rampton makes an application in
    58        that respect, then I will deal with it and I will certainly
    59        ask you what (if anything) you want to say about it, but we
    60        have not got there yet.  One thing everyone has to bear in

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