Day 030 - 03 Oct 94 - Page 06
1
2 I do have to say that if these defendants were represented
3 and this had happened, I would be asking your Lordship to
4 adjourn the case at the Defendants' expense. That option,
5 for reasons with which your Lordship is well familiar, is
6 not open to me. I merely ask that I be given the
7 opportunity to prepare a cross-examination, which I am
8 confident truly represents my clients' view of the science
9 of these matters. I could certainly try and do it, but
10 what I fear is -----
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12 MR. JUSTICE BELL: At the moment I do not see why you should.
13 It may be that there will be absolutely no objection from
14 the Defendants in that regard.
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16 MR. RAMPTON: I will sit down.
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18 MS. STEEL: Our position is that our witnesses are not saying
19 anything new, they have just gone into more detail.
20 Mr. Crawford, in particular, specifically said in his
21 original statement that he concurred with the statement in
22 the London Greenpeace fact sheet about the links between
23 diet, cancer of the breast and bowel and heart disease.
24 So there is nothing new coming in there. The statements
25 they have made now are largely in answer to what the
26 Plaintiffs' witnesses have said in the witness box.
27
28 If we had not asked them to make new witnesses statements,
29 we would have, in any event, gone through that with them
30 whilst they were giving evidence, so that you knew their
31 view on what the other witnesses had said. So, in some
32 ways the Plaintiffs are getting a bonus by knowing what
33 they are going to say before they get into the witness
34 box.
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36 MR. JUSTICE BELL: They should know what they are going to say
37 before they go into the witness box by disclosure of full
38 statements well in advance of the time when they go into
39 the witness box and, in fact, in advance of the
40 commencement of the trial, so that as witnesses on the
41 other side are called they know what they are going to
42 have to deal with.
43
44 I have to say that I think Mr. Cannon's statement is in
45 very much more positive terms than anything I expected him
46 to say. The Plaintiffs have to deal with that.
47
48 MS. STEEL: Some of the things that have been -----
49
50 MR. JUSTICE BELL: We have had a lot of debate about links,
51 causes and associations, and on a first reading of his
52 statement says it is a cause in relation to various parts
53 of the diet and cancer. It leaves open all sorts of
54 questions about whether McDonald's food amounts to a diet
55 or may do for some people, and so on. But I think it is
56 very much more positive and it has further detail in it.
57 I cannot pass any comment upon Professor Crawford because
58 I have not had time to read his.
59
60 MS. STEEL: As I say, the statements were really made in
