Day 096 - 03 Mar 95 - Page 70
1 MR. JUSTICE BELL: One matter has occurred to me and I will not
2 dig it out again, but having read Mr. Bennett's statement
3 it appears to me that in some places he refers to certain
4 documents and appears to give secondary evidence of their
5 actual contents, i.e. what they actually say. I am just
6 saying this without hearing argument. Therefore, there may
7 well be documents to which he refers which he will not be
8 able to refer to unless they are actually produced.
9
10 MR. RAMPTON: We are well conscious of that. We do not believe
11 at the moment that there are any documents which have not
12 already been disclosed.
13
14 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That may be. They have been disclosed.
15
16 MR. RAMPTON: I think they have, but if there is anything that
17 has not been disclosed and he wants to refer to, then it
18 will have to be disclosed if he is going to refer to them,
19 and duly will be in very good time before he gives
20 evidence.
21
22 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes, Ms. Steel and Mr. Morris, what matters
23 should be dealt with on Monday apart from scheduling? Are
24 there any other topics on scheduling, apart from those
25 I mentioned or Mr. Rampton mentioned?
26
27 MR. MORRIS: I do not think so. If we are going to leave some
28 matters to a later time, then the employment witnesses
29 matter Mr. Rampton raised does not seem to be urgent.
30
31 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It is with regard to scheduling. It is very
32 important with regard to scheduling.
33
34 MR. MORRIS: And the discovery relating to -- if we are going to
35 be dealing with some amendments and not others, for
36 example, the food poisoning matters -----
37
38 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What are you suggesting?
39
40 MR. MORRIS: Anything that arises out of that, because I think
41 you indicated that one of the purposes of doing the
42 specific pleadings was to see what discovery would be
43 relevant because of that.
44
45 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Let me just look at the moment. The first
46 five matters can be left for the time being. I have
47 paragraphed them (1) to (5), that is, destruction of the
48 environment. That is not to say that I do not think they
49 should not be heard fairly soon, but they do not have to be
50 heard before the rearing and slaughter and food poisoning
51 witnesses.
52
53 The remainder are relevant to food poisoning but the ones
54 about which there needs to be argument, 6, 12, 13 and 15,
55 if that is still alive. So, there are either three or four
56 questions of amendment which need to be dealt with on
57 Monday.
58
59 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, if those are all that are to be dealt
60 with on Monday, I do not anticipate a problem. Most of
