Day 128 - 24 May 95 - Page 54
1 Q. Were you asked for copies of those minutes?
2
3 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Do you know whether they still exist?
4 A. Certainly recent copies still exist, yes.
5
6 Q. Up to when -- that is since when?
7 A. Certainly, the last two to three years.
8
9 Q. The last?
10 A. Two to three years.
11
12 MS. STEEL: So that could be roughly how long the Company would
13 keep those types of documents?
14 A. Those I would certainly be able to access quite
15 quickly. They would be in my own files.
16
17 Q. Does the Company keep the copies of the High Levels
18 magazine and the Crew News it has archives of?
19 A. I believe that they are kept, yes.
20
21 MS. STEEL: I am not quite sure about how to ask the question.
22
23 MR. JUSTICE BELL: The Task Force meetings are quarterly you
24 say, are they?
25 A. Yes, they are.
26
27 MS. STEEL: I am not quite sure how to ask about who asked
28 Mrs. Barnes about these documents.
29
30 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Remind me, has there actually been any
31 direction, either guidance let alone order, as to discovery
32 of those?
33
34 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, that is what I was asking Mr. Atkinson.
35 I do not believe there has. The Defendants have made, of
36 course, a myriad of applications of a different kind.
37 I pay no attention to those until such time as your
38 Lordship says that I must make he discovery. When that
39 order is made, then the enquiries are made. I have no
40 recollection of an order, direction or application relating
41 to Health and Safety Task Force, or whatever it is now
42 called, minutes generally, nor indeed any specific date or
43 occasion -- none at all.
44
45 MR. JUSTICE BELL: There would be two stages, would there not?
46 If their existence is known and they are relevant, one
47 would expect them to be listed unless a view was taken that
48 their contents were not relevant.
49
50 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, that is what I meant by what I said
51 earlier. At the moment I see no relevance at all.
52
53 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Let us suppose we go past that stage. The
54 next question is they are then not listed, either because
55 their existence has not been tumbled to or because they are
56 known of but it is thought their contents are not
57 relevant. It does not, for the purpose of this discussion,
58 matter which it is, but the Defendants get to know of them
59 as they do now and they may make, I do not know whether
60 they can work it, if they are for the last two or three
