Day 052 - 21 Nov 94 - Page 28


     
     1        taking issue with -- I have to say that I was pondering in
     2        my mind just how far the admission that there was a
     3        considerable amount of evidence of a relationship between a
     4        diet high etc. and heart disease went and whether, in fact,
     5        that did amount to an admission of a causal relationship
     6        between such a diet and heart disease.
     7
     8   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, I do not believe that -----
     9
    10   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It was an admission which was directed at the
    11        words which the Defendants had used in their particulars of
    12        justification, because in relation to heart disease they
    13        used the words "relationship between" or something similar
    14        anyway.
    15
    16   MR. RAMPTON:  They did.  That has always been in one sense the
    17        trouble.
    18
    19   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  "An association between", "a relationship
    20        between".
    21
    22   MR. RAMPTON:  Yes.  It is difficult to get out of the habit,,
    23        perhaps, for a member of the Bar or the solicitors of
    24        admitting that which is pleaded against you rather than
    25        something which is not.  On the whole, the latter practice
    26        is discouraged.  It is only when I have got into this court
    27        and it has become clear (if it was not already) that the
    28        issue was nothing to do with whether some scientists
    29        thought this, or other scientists thought that, in relation
    30        to association as opposed to causation, that it occurred to
    31        me (and it was some time ago now; I do believe I have
    32        mentioned it) that it was necessary to say, neither side
    33        having any evidence on the question, that the causal nature
    34        of the relationship between diet and heart disease was
    35        accepted.
    36
    37   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Yes.  I have said on a number of occasions in
    38        the past, I think as recently as last Monday morning, that
    39        I would welcome some help from the Defendants as to what in
    40        their pleadings words like "links between", "relationship
    41        between", "association between" actually meant.  Since your
    42        admission is directed at their use of those words, the same
    43        would apply to the admission as well.
    44
    45   MR. RAMPTON:  I quite agree.  All I would say in defence of our
    46        admission, though I accept it does not take the matter much
    47        forward further, is that it does spring, as your Lordship
    48        has observed, from the way in which the defence is framed.
    49        As your Lordship knows, my second application which I will,
    50        if I may (because they really run on together), tack on to 
    51        this first one, is that the Defendants should be ordered to 
    52        state what the nature of their case is in this area of the 
    53        action, because it simply is not (and I am now getting
    54        ahead of myself) right that we, on the other hand, specify
    55        what we see to be the true meaning of the leaflet, whilst
    56        the Defendants, on the other hand, as it were, go along
    57        looking in both directions, hoping that the evidence may
    58        come out to support the stronger meaning, but if it does
    59        not they are willing to fall back on the weaker meaning.
    60

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