Day 305 - 25 Nov 96 - Page 44
1 your Lordship to decide.
2
3 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I am certainly not going to be in any
4 position to say in court that the specific occasion does or
5 does not have an important place.
6
7 MR. RAMPTON: Your Lordship will decide that at the end.
8
9 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I need to take all the evidence away to
10 consider. So I would be grateful if you would help me
11 generally in that area.
12
13 MR. RAMPTON: Yes, of course. I am to do it blow by blow.
14
15 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What do you want to do now -- because the
16 reality is this: you have got until about noon tomorrow to
17 finish off what you have got to say on publication, and
18 then you have got your two days to divide between you on
19 the question of counterclaim. So, the reality is that we
20 are looking at finishing what you have to say, subject to
21 anything you want to say about the law in reply to
22 Mr. Rampton on the law and subject to anything which you
23 are going to put in note or written form by way of these
24 further references, we are looking at you finishing what
25 you have to say on the counterclaim not later than our
26 midday adjournment on Thursday, which would certainly be
27 convenient for me, because gives Mr. Rampton an opportunity
28 to hand to me and to you what he has in writing and use the
29 whole or part of Thursday afternoon to say what he wants to
30 by way of introduction.
31
32 You can go on for half an hour now, or part of the half
33 hour, or, if you like, we will call it a day for today.
34 But then you must stick to those deadlines, as it were, for
35 the balance of this topic and counterclaim, which you have
36 got to do. But whether you go on now or we rise now and
37 resume at 10.30 in the morning, I will leave for you to
38 choose. I would like it to be a joint decision, obviously.
39
40 MR. MORRIS: I will see what I have, because I would rather get
41 some things out of the way if I can.
42
43 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
44
45 MR. MORRIS: I might grind to a halt.
46
47 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If you are grinding to a halt, accept as
48 much, and we will break off until the morning.
49
50 MR. MORRIS: Just a few points about the nature of
51 London Greenpeace. I think it was aptly described by one
52 of the investigators as "a collection of individuals", and
53 that any initiatives that got taken were not so much as a
54 result of collective decision-making, and certainly not
55 formal collective decision-making, so much as initiative of
56 the number of individuals that were present.
57
58 I think that is all important when considering the agency
59 argument that the Plaintiffs have to demonstrate on the
60 balance of probabilities, on evidence, physically how we
