Day 087 - 10 Feb 95 - Page 16
1 you can argue about that, but I have not seen that being
2 so. The sort of thing which it means to me -- maybe this
3 is too restrictive -- someone keeps a ledger of sales and
4 purchases and that ledger is compiled by information given
5 by a whole number of people, but the person who makes it is
6 under a duty, he is acting under a duty, when he compiles
7 that record.
8
9 MR. MORRIS: That seems very restrictive.
10
11 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It is a typical example, you see.
12
13 MR. MORRIS: Mr. Rampton said that that rule is applied very
14 broadly.
15
16 MR. RAMPTON: No, my Lord. I did not say that. Mr. Morris does
17 not always listen very carefully to what I say. I do not
18 blame him because I am frightfully boring, I know. What
19 I said was that the word "duty" has been broadly
20 interpreted. On the contrary, if one looks at paragraph
21 22-12 of Phipson on page 591, one finds (though this would
22 need to be looked at in the light of any recent authority
23 since it is five years old now) that the suggestion at the
24 very least is canvassed that record, contrary to what
25 Mr. Morris is supposing, does have the kind of restricted
26 sense which your Lordship suspects it of having.
27
28 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Would you like to read it out aloud?
29
30 MR. RAMPTON: Starting actually at 22-12: "The question of what
31 is a 'record' is also not entirely free from difficulty.
32 It has been doubted whether a file of correspondence is a
33 record for the purposes of the Criminal Evidence Act 1965.
34 The same reasoning may apply to the similar provisions
35 relating to 'records' in civil cases governed by section
36 4. In practice, the problem will often not be a problem in
37 civil proceedings, where files of correspondence are
38 frequently agreed to be admissible, and section 2 will
39 often render correspondence admissible in any event. In
40 order to satisfy the requirements of section 4(1), it is
41 necessary to produce the records themselves. Summaries of
42 other records will not suffice". Then it says: "In the
43 same way, the reports" -----
44
45 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes, can you carry on?
46
47 MR. RAMPTON: I will. "In the same way, the reports of
48 inspectors of companies appointed by the Secretary of State
49 for Trade are not records, being again secondary sources of
50 information. It is thought that minutes of meetings
51 constitute records, even though they may not be complete.
52 It is not a condition of admissibility that the record
53 should be proved to be full and accurate, only that there
54 was a duty to keep it. Against that must be set the
55 decision in Re D. (An Infant) where it was held that the
56 notes which the solicitor had taken of his interview with
57 the mother of a child in disputed wardship proceedings,
58 apparently because they were not an attempt at a complete
59 record: but this is to read words into the section.
60 Records include company minutes, cheques, bank statements,
