Day 251 - 17 May 96 - Page 37
1 whether there is any objection on behalf of the Plaintiff
2 and, if there is, I must make a decision on it. I do not
3 think it can be left in any state of doubt.
4
5 MS. STEEL: We will do that. I just want to raise, because we
6 were talking about going on to Mr. Nicholson ---
7
8 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
9
10 MRS. STEEL: -- I did not get back from the funeral until very
11 late last night. I have not had time -----
12
13 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If you are asking not to go on, I will ask
14 Mr. ------
15
16 MS. STEEL: I would prefer not to.
17
18 MR. RAMPTON: I am certainly not going to object to that, but it
19 does raise a singular difficulty on which I would very much
20 appreciate your Lordship's guidance.
21
22 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
23
24 MR. RAMPTON: It is this: Mr. Nicholson, if he is not here
25 today, and even if he were, since he is not to be heard
26 today, will not now come back into the witness box for
27 probably something like three weeks. I have some urgent
28 matters in relation to the issue of publication which I --
29 I say "I", I mean "we" -- and Mrs. Brinley-Codd have to
30 discuss with him; the reason for that being not only that
31 he is in charge of this litigation on behalf of the English
32 company and has the conduct of it, but that he knows about
33 the issue in a way which nobody else in the Company does.
34 I cannot ask for the sorts of decisions and answers to my
35 questions, which do not bear directly on Mr. Nicholson's
36 evidence at all, but do concern the general topic of
37 publication, there are certain things I cannot make any
38 progress on unless I can talk to Mr. Nicholson about them.
39 If I have to wait until his evidence is finished, then it
40 will be too late.
41
42 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
43
44 MS. STEEL: I am not sure why, I mean, Mr. Rampton has not said
45 why Mr. Nicholson cannot come some time next week. As far
46 as I am aware, he comes to court virtually every day. We
47 might be finished with Professor Naismith in one day, for
48 example. The other thing is if Mr. Rampton is making an
49 application to be able to speak to his witnesses -- even if
50 we started now, he certainly would not be finished this
51 afternoon ---
52
53 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No.
54
55 MS. STEEL: -- if Mr. Rampton is making an application to speak
56 to his witnesses, we would want to know the specific topics
57 which he wants to speak to him about before we would just
58 agree to that.
59
60 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, I am not asking for the defendants'
