Day 057 - 29 Nov 94 - Page 58
1 not understand what the Plaintiffs mean by this". The idea
2 there was to show them precisely what was meant by way of
3 example.
4
5 Certainly it was not intended to tie down the case to those
6 particular examples. What one ought to make clear is it is
7 not sought to go beyond the documents that have been
8 referred to in the Defence to Counterclaim. They have been
9 singled out. They have been appended to Defence to
10 Counterclaim or else it has been made quite clear which
11 particular pleadings are being referred to.
12
13 I could have gone through all of the documents that are
14 appended to the Defence to Counterclaim in the various
15 appendices. I could have given a list of every single time
16 that the Defendants are, apparently, quoted as having
17 spoken to the media or whatever. I could have done, but
18 that is something that, in our view, it is possible for
19 both sides to do in any event. If you are going to read
20 these documents, as you are bound to do if either side is
21 preparing their case, then one can see where, apparently,
22 the Defendants are quoted. It is not a difficult task in
23 one sense. On the other hand, it did seem perhaps going a
24 little too far in the midst of the trial to go through and
25 say every single time a quotation appears on the face of a
26 document which is available to the Defendants.
27
28 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
29
30 MR. ATKINSON: That is the only point. There is no trickery
31 involved here because the last sentence of that first
32 paragraph on page 6, "The Second Plaintiff will refer at
33 trial, if necessary, to all material disclosed or referred
34 in connection with the Defence counterclaim", whilst in one
35 sense it is saying, well, we go beyond these particular
36 examples, it is making quite clear that we are not going to
37 be springing any surprises with any new documents, other
38 than those referred to the Defence to Counterclaim. If
39 that ever happened, of course, due notice would be given to
40 the Defendants. We totally accept that there has to be
41 proper given notice given of any case made by the
42 Plaintiffs.
43
44 MR. JUSTICE BELL: What you are saying is the Defendants will
45 read those documents anyway and they can rest assured that
46 you are only going to rely at most, probably nowhere near
47 all of them, but at most it would be on references to them
48 being quoted in one form or another.
49
50 MR. ATKINSON: Can I give you an example of how these
51 particulars are meant to assist? I was trying to assist
52 the Defendants rather than trying to cause any sort of
53 deception here or indulge in any trickery. For example, in
54 Appendix 1 I put in orange examples of what we say are
55 repetition of the allegations complained of or similar
56 allegations. I did not have to do that, my Lord, but I did
57 that because it is clear sometimes that there appears to be
58 a breakdown of understanding between the parties as to
59 precisely what is being said. I just wanted to make clear
60 the nature of the case we were making in order to make it
