Day 311 - 06 Dec 96 - Page 60
1 look and see whether or not there are any Court of Appeal
2 decisions since the (?) case, but including that, which
3 might give your Lordship some guidance.
4
5 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
6
7 MR. RAMPTON: About damages.
8
9 MR. JUSTICE BELL: The other matter then is this: I have already
10 said that I would welcome your assistance on what reports,
11 apart from the report of 26th April 1996, are there which
12 were relied upon rather than the actual report of the
13 inquiry agent, or a note of the inquiry agent, and what the
14 position is as to any checking of any such report.
15
16 Implicit in that, of course, is that you have to decide,
17 whatever the situation is, whether you are actually
18 applying for leave. You may as well go back to square one
19 and say in respect of the section 4 notice in relation to
20 26th April 1990 report and any others which may come up,
21 because if you decide you are in fact applying for leave
22 then I will have a set piece application on that and hear
23 what Ms. Steel and Mr. Morris want to say.
24
25 MR. RAMPTON: Yes.
26
27 MR. JUSTICE BELL: The other matter is this. Although I think
28 the legal matters which have cropped up today are, in fact,
29 very limited in number there have been some and you have
30 developed the matter further, and I would like you to
31 consider whether with your clients whether it would be
32 right that Ms. Steel and Mr. Morris receive a transcript of
33 today's hearing.
34
35 MR. RAMPTON: I will say that without even asking them.
36
37 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It seems to me it is only right that they
38 should receive -- if you would normally accept that they
39 should receive transcripts of bits where there has been
40 legal discussion between you and me, then the exercise of
41 editing to keep out what is purely factual calls more than
42 it is worth.
43
44 MR. RAMPTON: No, as your Lordship was speaking I was handed a
45 note by Mrs Brinley-Codd to say the Defendants should have
46 the whole of today's transcript. They have already got the
47 whole of Tuesday's and Wednesday's.
48
49 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Very well. The next step is this then.
50 Thank you for what you have said so far. It seems to me
51 that we have got the two matters we have just dealt with
52 which you want to address me on. Unless you have anything
53 to say, what is left on Ms. Steel and Mr. Morris's side is
54 that they can say anything further to me which they want to
55 on the question of counterclaim. If need be, I will put
56 time limits on that but I hope that is not necessary
57 because I am certainly not going to do it now. If they
58 want to say anything more about damages, in the light of
59 the discussion we have had they should certainly be able to
60 do that.
