Day 146 - 03 Jul 95 - Page 13


     
     1        the effect of those exchanges:  The first is that, as far
     2        as I can tell, your Lordship's impression at that time --
     3        that was only part way through Ms. Hovi's evidence-in-chief
     4         -- was exactly the same as mine, that there was a very
     5        great deal of material to which she had deposed or which we
     6        had had no notification whatsoever save in some cases in
     7        the most general terms.
     8
     9   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes.  I think it would be helpful if you are
    10        able to do so now if you just took one or two examples.
    11
    12   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, I will, if I may, do that in a moment.  I
    13        will do it, if I may, by reference to Mr. Bone's statement.
    14          I will certainly do that and I will refer your Lordship
    15        back to the transcript for that purpose and to Ms. Hovi's
    16        original statement.
    17
    18        My Lord, the second thing emerging from that passage is
    19        this, that I said that I would not object to her continuing
    20        along that line of unnotified examination-in-chief so long
    21        as I could be confident that I would get leave to rebut it
    22        with evidence of my own and, if necessary or appropriate,
    23        to cross-examine her further.
    24
    25        The third thing I noticed on reading that exchange is that
    26        right at the end of it Mr. Morris, having had the
    27        indication from your Lordship that he should go on with the
    28        evidence-in-chief, the first thing that he comes to at the
    29        bottom of page 40, lines 52 and 53, is something about
    30        minced beef production allegedly during a night shift which
    31        he himself says he does consider to be a new point.
    32
    33        My Lord, going from there, if I was right about that, there
    34        is a great deal more, although not perhaps quite as much as
    35        had preceded my intervention, of the same category, that is
    36        to say, what I call new evidence.  When finally I got to
    37        ask Ms. Hovi about that, I did not ask it directly as it
    38        happened.  It is on page 31 of 31st March, the next day,
    39        112, starting at line 10.
    40
    41        I was suggesting to Ms. Hovi that she was angry about being
    42        dismissed and had, therefore, really used this case as an
    43        opportunity to get her own back.  She said at line 14:
    44        "Well, you said yourself", that is me, "yesterday that
    45        I had not included everything, and I definitely told to the
    46        Defendants that I should make a full statement, should
    47        I include everything?  And they advised me not to because
    48        the statement would have been very long if I had included
    49        all the evidence that I gave yesterday on the state of the
    50        matters at Jarretts." 
    51 
    52        Question:  "They advised you not no make supplementary 
    53        statement including all that material?"  Answer:  "I was
    54        not advised on the possibility of making that.  I am very
    55        sorry".  I asked:  "Were they trying to take us by surprise
    56        in court?  Is that what they were trying to do, the
    57        Defendants?"  Answer:  "I have no idea."
    58
    59        But, my Lord, plainly two things about that:  In Ms. Hovi's
    60        mind it is quite apparent that the evidence she has been

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