Day 309 - 03 Dec 96 - Page 19

     
     1   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  If I put again what I was feeling for a
     2        little while ago: if eating more than the occasional meal
     3        would lead to this risk, then one could say, as a matter of
     4        broad judgment -- because all these matters seem to me to
     5        be matters of broad judgment, unless you are dealing with
     6        some carefully reasoned engineering conclusion or something
     7        like that -- one could say that it is substantially
     8        justified.
     9
    10   MR. RAMPTON:  I doubt it, because once one gets to the master
    11        qualification "more than occasionally", one is dealing in
    12        what Lord Diplock used to be pleased to call numinons or
    13        numina, imprecise concepts.  What does "occasionally" mean?
    14        In order that it should be substantially true, does it have
    15        to be shown in the evidence that eating it maybe once a
    16        month will have that effect?  Does it have to be shown that
    17        eating it -- what is occasionally:  once a year, once every
    18        six months?  I confess, I do not know.
    19
    20   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  But if that were so, one has gone back to
         saying that the meaning means eating it once, one meal
    22        ever, has that effect; and that gets rid of diet
    23        altogether, which was the whole rationale of the way I have
    24        got to the meaning, is it not?
    25
    26   MR. RAMPTON:  I cannot tell your Lordship what the ordinary
    27        reader -- the words which you have are mine -- what the
    28        words "occasionally" or "more than occasionally" would
    29        actually have meant to him as he expressed himself to
    30        himself when he read the leaflet, whether he is saying to
    31        himself, when he reads this: "Aha, I must be careful of
    32        this stuff, because if I eat it more than occasionally it
    33        is likely to have these effects."
    34
    35   MR. MORRIS:  Can I just say, I do not know exactly what this
    36        discussion is exactly in aid of, but if it is an
    37        interpretation of your judgment, then I think Mr. Rampton
    38        is trying to interpret in a way, obviously, that is
    39        favourable to him.
    40
    MR. JUSTICE BELL:  It is not interpretation of my judgment.  It
    42        is how I apply it to the evidence in the case.
    43
    44   MR. MORRIS:  The judgment says nothing about: "If you eat it
    45        more than occasionally, then there will be a real risk."
    46
    47   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  No.  It says: "If you eat it...."
    48
    49   MR. MORRIS:  If you have an occasional meal, obviously, nobody
    50        would think that would be a risk. 
    51 
    52   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  I am not having re-argument of what it 
    53        means.  I have ruled what it means.  Can I put it the other
    54        way round:  if you really have got to eat McDonald's meals
    55        very often before this is true, namely, that it may very
    56        well make your diet unhealthy, then it is not substantially
    57         -- it is not justified.
    58
    59   MR. RAMPTON:  The meaning goes far further, far further, and
    60        that is that the truth of the matter on the evidence --