Day 311 - 06 Dec 96 - Page 43


     
     1        does), but it has everything to do with the counterclaim.
     2
     3        But the murder illustration is only an example of what
     4        I was submitting to your Lordship this morning, namely,
     5        that you can have an honest belief in a number of things,
     6        but if you cloak them with a whole lot of other serious
     7        allegations for which you do not have an honest belief,
     8        then the court may well infer that your dominant motive for
     9        the publication was an improper one.
    10
    11   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I understand that.  It is just if I was
    12        missing some point in relation to -----
    13
    14   MR. RAMPTON:  No, no, no.
    15
    16   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I can see it might be relevant in this way,
    17        that the Defendants say part of the meaning is all the
    18        killing of animals; and if I thought that was the
    19        defamatory and I expressed reservations about that ---
    20
    21   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes, I agree.
    22
    23   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  -- for the ordinary reader, then I suppose
    24        that the Defendants might say:  But it is fair comment,
    25        and, since it is fair comment on part of what is
    26        defamatory, then it washes away a lot of what else is in
    27        that part of the case.  You say no, it does not.
    28
    29   MR. RAMPTON:  It is not in what is that part of the case; it is
    30        what is in the leaflet as a whole.
    31
    32   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes, indeed.
    33
    34   MR. RAMPTON:  It may not even wash as far as torture.
    35
    36   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  No.  But now you have said that it was
    37        written before we had the discussion -----
    38
    39   MR. RAMPTON:  I should have said that.
    40
    41   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  If we go on to counterclaim, then.
    42
    43   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes.
    44
    45   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  In fact, there are not an awful lot of
    46        questions I have to ask this afternoon.  What I think would
    47        be helpful -- because I think I have got hold of it, and
    48        I will express what I understand -- but it reverts back to
    49        when you stood up a few days ago and said that Ms. Steel
    50        and Mr. Morris were missing the point, and Mr. Morris 
    51        wanted you to explain. 
    52 
    53   MR. RAMPTON:  I have done it now.
    54
    55   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It is in here, but I think it might be just
    56        as well if you went through it in your own way.  Can I say
    57        what I understand?  What I understand Ms. Steel was arguing
    58        particularly -- this was, you were saying, in response to
    59        an attack -- that the attack had come in the leaflet which,
    60        it was said, had not been published since the writs were

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