Day 158 - 19 Jul 95 - Page 56
1
2 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Just looking at Mr. Morris' proposed
3 amendment, at the moment it might be that I am disinclined
4 to allow words "regions including and/or bordering areas of
5 ex-rainforest land" because there does not seem to be any
6 evidence that they do actually border. Certainly they do
7 not include and no evidence that they border.
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9 MR. MORRIS: Mato Grosso?
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11 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I am talking to Mr. Rampton at the moment.
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13 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, to be fair to Mr. Morris, I think what
14 the plea means is, what the English means is, I do not know
15 what the plea means -- this part of the pleading has foxed
16 me ever since I first got it -- Mato Grosso is said to
17 include or border an area of ex-rainforest land. The area
18 of ex-rainforest land which Mato Grosso is said to border
19 and/or include of course is not identified. So it is very
20 difficult to see what this plea is meant to mean.
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22 MR. JUSTICE BELL: The amendment, if I allowed it, following my
23 train of thought, and I am not by any means concluding the
24 matter at the moment, the Mato Grosso is the area of Mato
25 Grosso Do Sul which appears on the most westerly of the
26 northern batch of four red circles. If I reach the view
27 that there was no evidence that it came from other Mato
28 Grosso which had been rain forest within a definable period
29 of time, your 1,000 kilometres from Barretos goes into
30 something which is called Mato Grosso on the larger map and
31 that appears to be Mato Grosso proper if one compares it.
32
33 MR. RAMPTON: My Lord, that is the distinction.
34
35 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Query then whether one has any evidence as to
36 when, if ever, that was actually rain forest.
37
38 MR. RAMPTON: That is what I have been saying. Anyway,
39 Mato Grosso proper and the blue 1,000 kilometre line and
40 Barretos is Vesty and Vesty alone. Mr. Morris has taken
41 Mato Grosso and Goiais from the Vesty letter. He has not
42 got them from anywhere else. The habitual suppliers,
43 Braslo, use the orange sources. Campo Grande is probably a
44 Mato Grosso Do Sul; Goiania which is on the outside of the
45 500-mile radius from San Paolo, is probably in the southern
46 part of Goiais. Uberiandia is in Minas which is even
47 further away from the rain forest. Bauru is in the
48 province or state of San Paolo itself.
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50 So if the plea is to have any sense at all it must be
51 asserted that the plants for habitual supply, that is to
52 say the orange ones, the four I have just mentioned, the
53 Braslo ones, are either on ex-rainforest land or next door,
54 bordering. The fact that Mato Grosso and Goiais may in
55 some huge part touch rain forest or ex-rainforest areas is
56 completely beside the point, because they have no bearing
57 on McDonald's regular sources of supply. They relate only
58 to the one occasion in 1983, so far as the information that
59 anybody has at the moment is concerned and that is what
60 matters for the purpose of this application.
