Day 163 - 25 Sep 95 - Page 45
1 be true or all admitted, to your Lordship's ability to make
2 a fair and just decision on the issue of employment which
3 is, after all, do McDonald's treat their employees properly
4 or not, broadly speaking. Then we would submit that the
5 burden which allowing these amendments would place on us is
6 disproportionately large compared with the benefit which
7 the litigation of these 12 allegations would confer on the
8 case as a whole.
9
10 It would be different, and a responsible litigant who was
11 having to pay his and the other side's legal bills at the
12 end of it might take this into account, if we had any
13 remedy in costs. Your Lordship may well say, oh well, but
14 you knew when you brought this case that the Defendants
15 were impecunious and would never be able to pay anything.
16 True, my Lord, but that is not, with respect, the answer to
17 the point I am making. The point I am making is that we
18 shall suffer a real injustice in terms of time and money if
19 these amendments are allowed without any corresponding
20 benefit or justice being conferred on the case as a whole
21 or on the Defendants' case. Even supposing that these
22 allegations are all true, how in the end would that (this
23 is the question I invite your Lordship to answer) help your
24 Lordship to decide that the what the leaflet says about
25 McDonald's and employment is true? That ultimately is the
26 question which matters.
27
28 Mr. Morris even at this late stage in the case may be
29 forgiven for thinking that he is entitled to lead evidence
30 which may simply, as it were, damage McDonald's
31 credibility, whether on what they said in court or what
32 they said outside court. That is not so. He is only
33 entitled to lead evidence which does truly speaking go to
34 the issue of justification. I am bound to say that I have
35 the gravest doubt whether, even if all these things were
36 proved, they would have that effect.
37
38 My Lord, I will if I may, and I think it is necessarily
39 really because your Lordship despite what I said may be
40 inclined to give leave, draw your Lordship's attention to
41 one or two howlers in the pleading. The first one is
42 paragraph 2, maybe your Lordship has already spotted this
43 which comes I think from page 45.
44
45 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I do not want to take you out of order, so
46 you follow your own order.
47
48 MR. RAMPTON: If your Lordship wants to, I do not mind. I just
49 took them in the order in which they were pleaded.
50
51 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It was merely because 1 ----
52
53 MR. RAMPTON: I take 1 to be totally meaningless as a plea of
54 justification, two people are having an argument. It leads
55 absolutely nowhere. The other thing I do believe that is
56 important in cases of this kind is that it is not
57 sufficient for a defendant to plead, "Ooh, you have been
58 criticised" or "Ooh, somebody has alleged something against
59 you." Even if it is the King of Siam that has made the
60 allegation still less does it go for a minor official of
