Day 157 - 18 Jul 95 - Page 39
1 moan about -- first, they started off moaning that the
2 extracts were inaccurate and then, as I pointed out, if
3 they are inaccurate, they cannot have been -----
4
5 MR. RAMPTON: No, I did not say "inaccurate," I said
6 "misleading".
7
8 MR. JUSTICE BELL: He never said that; he said they gave an
9 inaccurate picture of the evidence so far.
10
11 MS. STEEL: I believe initially -- I can check this if needs be
12 -- that the Plaintiffs said that the quotations were
13 inaccurate. Then he backed peddled after I argued that if
14 they are inaccurate they cannot have come from the
15 transcripts. He is now complaining that only extracts are
16 being reported which, he says, are selective. The fact is
17 that any reporting of the case is by definition only going
18 to be an extract because, basically, no newspaper is going
19 to report verbatim even the whole of one day's
20 proceedings. It is just as simple as that really.
21
22 There is no obligation in law that if you are going to
23 report on a court case you have to report on every single
24 word that has been said.
25
26 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, but if my recollection is right, if you
27 want to take advantage of the various privileges, it has to
28 be a fair and accurate report taken as a whole, no doubt.
29
30 MS. STEEL: Yes. The fact that the Plaintiffs have not brought
31 any action against any either organisation or newspaper
32 indicates that they do not have a leg to stand on. They
33 are just complaining and trying to use this as an attempt
34 to withdraw transcripts from us to hinder and sabotage our
35 defence. The same goes for copyright; if there was any
36 breach of copyright, then the appropriate action could have
37 been taken under the Copyright Act. It is all just a smoke
38 screen from the Plaintiffs.
39
40 MR. JUSTICE BELL: You must close your submissions unless there
41 is anything else.
42
43 MS. STEEL: No, I just wanted to say, finally, I just wanted to
44 reiterate the part about if we were, effectively, censored
45 from talking about what had gone on in this case to anybody
46 other than witnesses and legal advisers, either from
47 referring to transcripts or showing the transcripts or
48 talking about them over the telephone, or anything like
49 that, effectively, we are going to be intimidated into not
50 talking about this case at all, and that is the whole aim
51 of the Plaintiffs withdrawing the transcripts.
52
53 They want us to be frightened to talk about the evidence.
54 We could argue that that is a contempt of court because it
55 is an attempt to intimidate future witnesses as we are
56 future witnesses.
57
58 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
59
60 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, just to say that your Lordship can be
