Day 292 - 01 Nov 96 - Page 41
1 whatever, part of the experience. Of course, there are
2 headings that refer to McGarbage and McWasteful.
3
4 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Yes.
5
6 MR. MORRIS: So obviously, all the same considerations that
7 I have stated before, and I will not repeat, about the
8 context of the fact sheet being one of criticism of the
9 hamburger industry, US corporations companies in general,
10 apply to this section, and, secondly, the fact that the
11 back page contains alternatives again means that there is a
12 positive message throughout this fact sheet of concern to
13 improve society which is relevant, for example, for the
14 malice allegation et cetera. If we can show how we are not
15 motivated by malice for any sentence in the fact sheet, I
16 mean, for every sentence in the fact sheet, if we can
17 demonstrate to the court that from the evidence that we
18 have called that each sentence in the fact sheet can be
19 justified as fact or fair comment, that goes towards
20 defeating the malice claim, and that also applies,, of
21 course, to the counterclaim on their press release where
22 they say, for example, the damaging of the ozone layer is a
23 statement in the fact sheet which they have characterised
24 as lies.
25
26 So when people received the -- this is a general statement
27 about the counterclaim -- leaflets that McDonald's issued
28 on the counterclaim, that are relevant to the counterclaim,
29 they did not send people the fact sheets, they did not say,
30 'This is the document we consider it means this', they
31 just said, 'It means this', and throughout the press
32 release said it is lies.
33
34 Therefore, obviously, some members of the public may know
35 what is in the fact sheet and therefore McDonald's have to
36 show the fact sheet is lies, but also that they have to
37 show what was in their press release saying 'the fact sheet
38 said...' is lies, because that is the defamation. They
39 say, the fact sheet is lies, lies, lies -- nine times or
40 whatever it is in the press release -- and then they
41 summarise what the fact sheet states in those eight bullet
42 points in the press release, and they are basically saying,
43 this is lies that me and Helen are responsible for, we have
44 said they damaged the ozone layer, we have said they
45 produce food which is unhealthy. And for people reading
46 that most of them would think that McDonald's has called us
47 liars for saying those things, even if they have
48 mistranslated or misinterpreted what the fact sheet
49 actually does say.
50
51 So that, of course, we would pray in aid of the relevance
52 of the plastic packaging certainly as regards ozone,
53 because that is a specific statement which they have said
54 is a lie. We have demonstrated by evidence in this case
55 that in fact not only do we genuinely believe it is true,
56 so it cannot be a lie, but in fact it is true. McDonald's
57 own expert conceded that they used a significant amount of
58 ozone depleting chemicals.
59
60 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Right. We will have a break there. I have
