Day 171 - 11 Oct 95 - Page 38


     
     1        thoughts which have cross my mind.
     2
     3   MR. RAMPTON:  Can I say two things?  I do, as a matter of fact,
     4        see the case as I think I understand your Lordship sees
     5        it.  There is no question about that.  Can I say two
     6        things?  As a matter of strict obligation for discovery,
     7        I do not believe, and respectfully submit that I am not
     8        obliged to make discovery in relation to particular
     9        criticisms which the Defendants have been unable, through
    10        whatever sources are available to them to make, either in
    11        the pleading or through a witness.  That I believe to be
    12        the strict position.
    13
    14        Howsoever, I am very anxious that your Lordship should
    15        reach a right conclusion, with respect.  It is not meant to
    16        sound impertinent, but I am anxious that your Lordship
    17        should reach a right conclusion in this case and not a
    18        false conclusion based on inadequate material.  If to that
    19        end, and to that end alone, I can supply your Lordship with
    20        material which does not lead to days and days of
    21        investigation of paltry incidents -- not for the
    22        individuals concerned, but for the issues in the case --
    23        over periods of hours or days, then I am willing to do it.
    24        What I am not willing to envisage or embark on, unless I am
    25        ordered to do so by your Lordship, is detailed
    26        investigation of this, that or the other little incident at
    27        Bath or criticism, be it major or minor, over a period of
    28        two years, because I really do believe -- and I hope
    29        I might persuade your Lordship that I am right about it --
    30        that in the end that has little, if any, bearing on the
    31        outcome of the case, because what matters after all in a
    32        case of this kind, since the Company is the Plaintiff, are
    33        really four things -- I do not know whether I have said
    34        this before; if I have, I apologise, and I will say it
    35        again:  what policies the Company has in each area of the
    36        case; what systems it has to see that those policies are
    37        applied in practice; what despite those systems may go
    38        wrong from time to time; and, fourth, what, if they do go
    39        wrong the Company, does to remedy them.
    40
    41        There is no doubt on the evidence in the case so far, and
    42        as a matter of ordinary common sense and knowledge of the
    43        world, that category 3 exists; things do go wrong from time
    44        to time.  But if categories 1, 2 and 4 are in place so far
    45        as the Plaintiffs are concerned, why then, really this part
    46        of the case is at an end.
    47
    48        If we can assist your Lordship to a proper conclusion on
    49        those four categories, the first two and the last one in
    50        particular, by making a discovery which we do not believe 
    51        we are strictly bound to make, we will nonetheless make 
    52        it. 
    53
    54   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Thank you.
    55
    56   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, that deals with what I call unspecified
    57        criticisms; and they do remain unspecified.
    58
    59        I think that leaves only, so far as I am concerned, the rap
    60        sessions, the notes of the rap sessions.  I think I have

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