Day 247 - 10 May 96 - Page 53
1 convenience. He is a busy man with a company to run. For
2 certainly the last hour and for much of this morning
3 Mr. Morris and Ms. Steel appear to be using their so-called
4 cross-examination of Mr. Preston as a way of making
5 speeches about documents which are in the bundles. The
6 vast majority of the documents which they have put to Mr.
7 Preston are either McDonald's documents which speak for
8 themselves, or else they are documents about which he
9 cannot possibly give any evidence, such as the Swedish
10 broadcasting code, or whatever it is. My Lord, I do,
11 through your Lordship, urge the Defendants to stick to
12 proper, defined issues in the case about which they
13 perceive your Lordship may derive help from the answers
14 that Mr. Preston may give. Either that, and I hesitate to
15 say or this is a filibuster by which ----
16
17 MR. JUSTICE BELL: I do not think it is a filibuster, but you
18 must pay attention to what I said yesterday. I have been
19 very loathe to interrupt you because I do not want to
20 interrupt you so that you fail to get out a good point.
21 But what I think you have done quite a lot today, and
22 certainly this afternoon, is just use Mr. Preston as a
23 guide to the documents. That is something you can
24 perfectly well do with me direct. If I can repeat what
25 I said yesterday, it is only if Mr. Preston can give direct
26 admissible evidence on a new aspect of the case or can
27 bring a new view to an old topic that you really ought to
28 be asking him any questions.
29
30 MR. MORRIS: I think the last two examples have been good
31 examples where, if that document we had from Sweden would
32 not have been admissible evidence on its own without a
33 witness to verify it ----
34
35 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It has become no more admissible.
36
37 MR. MORRIS: No, but the witness has verified that in some
38 countries McDonald's is banned from advertising to
39 children, not because it is McDonald's but because all
40 advertising is banned to children, and that is something
41 which he accepts.
42
43 MR. JUSTICE BELL: It does not help me, actually, to reach a
44 conclusion in this case, that is the trouble.
45
46 MR. MORRIS: We will argue in due course that not only are we
47 right to criticise the effects of advertising on children,
48 but some governments in the world, surprisingly enough,
49 actually agree with us.
50
51 MR. JUSTICE BELL: That, quite frankly, cannot help me. Look,
52 I refuse to hear President Clinton's view -- because he is
53 not right in my judgment. I have refused to hear of a
54 committee of the Congress of the United States of America
55 because they are not right in my judgment, nor is the
56 Swedish legislature. For better or worse, I have to reach
57 my own decision, and I may be for or against you on
58 advertising but I will not be for you because the Swedish
59 legislature has passed a provision such as I have just
60 seen, and I will not be against you because the British
