Day 309 - 03 Dec 96 - Page 71
1 so we were hoping to have or at least until Monday to do
2 that.
3
4 MR. JUSTICE BELL: You have to look at the timetable. Having
5 sat down and thought about it, I am convinced that we can
6 now finish the hearing of this case, by which I mean the
7 hearing subject to me reserving judgment and giving
8 judgment in due course, before the end of this term.
9
10 MR. RAMPTON: I hope long before that.
11
12 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I do not think there is any risk of failing
13 to do that now. The question is, which days we sit and
14 which we do not to achieve that objective. What I want you
15 to tell me tomorrow, so that when I break off I can decide
16 for how long and when things should be done, is how long
17 you are suggesting that you will need to deal with the
18 law. We will sit tomorrow morning. It looks as if we may
19 well then not sit tomorrow afternoon and Thursday. We will
20 sit on Friday and before the end of Friday I will have
21 asked Mr. Rampton what I want to ask about his submissions
22 and anything I want to ask him about points of law.
23
24 The essential then, it seems to me, is for you, during next
25 week, not only to have delivered your submissions on points
26 of law so that I can read and digest them and Mr. Rampton
27 and Mr. Atkinson and Mrs. Brinley-Codd can look at them,
28 but for you to have said anything that you want to say on
29 the law, and, if I think it fair that you should be able to
30 address me in reply to Mr. Rampton on the counterclaim, to
31 have dealt with that next week as well.
32
33 That will then leave the situation that there is nothing
34 more to be done before I reserve judgment, save that you
35 have the option (if you wish to take it) of delivering any
36 further written references on the issues of fact by one
37 o'clock on Wednesday. So, I will wait and see if I receive
38 any of those. No doubt Mr. Rampton, Mr. Atkinson and
39 Mrs. Brinley-Codd will. If Mr. Glenn gets a telephone call
40 from Mrs. Brinley-Codd saying we would like half a day or
41 an hour, or whatever it is, to say something about those,
42 we will find it either some time preferably on the Thursday
43 rather than the Friday.
44
45 MR. MORRIS: Yes. Can I just say, in terms of a personal
46 matter, I want to go on holiday on the Friday, the 20th.
47 I have made a provisional booking to that effect.
48
49 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What I suggest is, you go ahead and make your
50 booking, if you wish, because if Mr. Rampton did want to
51 say something about any written submissions you put in on
52 matters of fact, he would almost certainly be able to do it
53 on the Thursday and, if he did not, Ms. Steel would just
54 have to hold the fort for both of you on the Friday. There
55 would not be any question of you coming back to what
56 Mr. Rampton said, anyway. It would just be that one of you
57 would be present in court.
58
59 MS. STEEL: If we made sure that any references, whatever, that
60 we wanted to hand in were in by the, I do not know, the
