Day 177 - 26 Oct 95 - Page 54
1 leaflet, "Everything about McDonald's which they normally
2 try and hide from you. Everything they don't want you to
3 know".
4
5 So the reader approaches the leaflet in two expectations:
6 One, that McDonald's deliberate deceptions are going to be
7 revealed and, second, that the true facts -- not opinions
8 or possibilities -- the true facts about McDonald's are
9 going to be laid out so that the reader can compare the
10 image with the reality. As the Defendants themselves have
11 called, although this does not help in interpretation but
12 it may be a convenient though misleading way of describing
13 it, it is a fact sheet. I say it is misleading because, of
14 course, it is not true any of it, but its appearance -- it
15 has the appearance of a fact sheet. We are all very
16 familiar with it and one does not need to read the text in
17 any detail at all to remember that it consists almost
18 entirely of all factual assertions about McDonald's.
19
20 The introduction says, the leaflet is asking you to think
21 for a moment about what lies behind McDonald's clean,
22 bright image. "It's got a lot to hide", and then the very
23 last sentence of the introduction: "The truth about
24 hamburgers is enough to put you off them for life."
25
26 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I have got a point on that which I would like
27 your help on.
28
29 MR. RAMPTON: Yes.
30
31 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Could you just read those parts again?
32
33 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, yes. I will read the whole introduction,
34 if it will help.
35
36 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, it is not that. I had in mind, and
37 I cannot put my finger on it, that certainly there was --
38 in your skeleton argument, and I did not pick it up at the
39 time, concerning what the leaflet was capable of meaning.
40 You set out in paragraph 2(2)(i)(a) and (b) or paragraph
41 2(1)(ii)(a) or (b) -- whichever it was -- I think parts of
42 the leaflet you relied on for construction. It started
43 off, "What's wrong with McDonald's? Everything they don't
44 want you to know", and then went on to parts of the
45 following introduction, which are not actually pleaded as
46 words complained of in the amended Statement of Claim. I
47 would like just to check if that is right or wrong -- let
48 me just see -- and whether that matters or not.
49
50 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, I think ----
51
52 MR. JUSTICE BELL: If it was a personal injury case I would not
53 dream of raising such a point, but when one is in
54 defamation -----
55
56 MR. RAMPTON: Two things, if I may say so: First your Lordship
57 is right that it has to be pleaded. Second it is.
58
59 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It is 2 -- it is in your ----
60
