Day 165 - 27 Sep 95 - Page 12
1 meetings. It is inconceivable that everybody present at
2 all the meetings agreed with everything that was taking
3 place, actively participated in everything that was taking
4 place and was responsible for everything that was referred
5 to at the meetings. Therefore, if the anti-McDonald's
6 campaign by this stage was only a minor part of the group's
7 activities, then there is no reason why, well, obviously
8 that just weakens the Plaintiffs' argument about mere
9 involvement in the group making people responsible for that
10 campaign.
11
12 There was the argument about Mr. Rampton claiming that if
13 we had the full notes we would spend days arguing about
14 some peripheral event which, I think, is extremely
15 improbable. If may be that we do not want to ask questions
16 about anything that turns up in the notes, but it may be
17 that there is something there that can enable us to
18 conclusively prove that what the witness has written in the
19 notes is incorrect and, therefore, casts doubt on the
20 reliability of the rest of the notes and, therefore, the
21 evidence being given in relation to that particular meeting
22 or the evidence being given by that witness in general.
23
24 On that point, I believe there is actually a distinction
25 between credit and credibility or reliability. It seemed
26 to me from reading through the legal cases that were
27 referred to yesterday that when they were talking about
28 credit they were talking about the point of giving a dog a
29 bad name and hanging him, i.e. that if someone had lied on
30 a previous occasion or had been convicted of something on a
31 previous occasion, that meant that they were guilty on this
32 occasion as well or that they were lying on this occasion
33 as well.
34
35 However, here we are talking about the credibility of
36 evidence and, obviously, within notes of an individual
37 event it is quite likely that if the witness has got one or
38 two parts of what happened wrong that other parts could be
39 wrong as well. I do think that is different to credit.
40
41 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Is there anything more you want to say?
42
43 MS. STEEL: Yes, there is. I am not quite sure what to go on
44 to next. I do not really have my notes in a -- there was a
45 reference in, I think it was, the Thorpe case to fairness,
46 that if one side had access to, in that case it was the
47 criminal convictions of the Plaintiff, then I think it was
48 agreed that it was fair that the Plaintiff should have
49 access to the criminal convictions of the Defendant.
50
51 In the notes that have been disclosed, Mr. Rampton said
52 that he blanked out everything that was not relevant.
53 Yesterday I referred to the part about the musicians
54 network doing a benefit for Greenpeace.
55
56 MR. JUSTICE BELL: Neill LJ said that at first sight there was
57 some force in that argument, but then went on to say he was
58 satisfied, however, that it has been the long standing
59 practice not to order discovery which is directed solely to
60 credit. By that he then referred to how easy it would be
