Day 309 - 03 Dec 96 - Page 41
1 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Lots of things, I do not think it is
2 productive to look into if there was a misunderstanding
3 whose, if anyone's, responsibility it was. I just want to
4 know whether I can take whatever I think I may from that
5 document.
6
7 MR. RAMPTON: I respectfully recommend your Lordship to look at
8 the document. In fact, there are, I think, about five of
9 them because it is tabs 11 to 17 in the same file. And
10 also have a look at Mr. Hawke's evidence and see what it
11 comes out at. I hope you will forgive me if I do not,
12 unless your Lordship asks me to, then come back to it
13 because, having read it, it did not seem to me to amount to
14 very much.
15
16 MR. JUSTICE BELL: At the bottom of that page you say "It might
17 be thought a sufficient answer to the first question is the
18 advertising, is the advertising as advertising directed at
19 children objectionable in itself"?
20
21 MR. RAMPTON: No, that is-----
22
23 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That is, is advertising to children
24 intrinsically objectionable?
25
26 MR. RAMPTON: Yes, that is the one. I must say I do not think
27 much of the point at 11.2. I am bound to say I think I am
28 with your Lordship in believing that ultimately it is a
29 question for the court. If the court happens to agree with
30 the regulatory authorities that is one thing, if the court
31 does not then that is bad luck on the regulatory
32 authorities. All one would say then is McDonald's have
33 obeyed the rules, that is a feather in their cap; whether
34 it goes far enough is a matter for what your Lordship
35 thinks of the advertising.
36
37 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes. It seems to me that it must be what I,
38 as the embodiment of the ordinary reader, actually makes of
39 it, and these may be matters I can take into account. But
40 one can imagine a regulatory body which did not, let us get
41 right away from it, advertising in principle; one can
42 imagine a regulatory body which thought that a certain kind
43 of activity was not really very good form but it was so
44 entrenched in the particular society that the most one
45 could do was regulate around the fringes of it.
46
47 MR. RAMPTON: Absolutely. I quite agree, respectfully, and I do
48 agree. I would also say this, that one can imagine a jury
49 case where some advocates, not me, might try and bamboozle
50 a jury into, as it were, subjugating their own judgment to
51 that of the regulatory authorities and the judge having to
52 say to the jury, 'I am afraid that is not right, it is up
53 to you what you think of the advertising'.
54
55 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes. Thank you. Then 11, 2, 3, the answer
56 to the question could only be, yes, in all the
57 circumstances, if one took the view that children,
58 especially small children, were unable to distinguish fact
59 from fiction, reality from fantasy. Could one not say, or
60 just that they might not be able fully to appreciate that
