Day 045 - 03 Nov 94 - Page 26

     
     1
     2   MR. MORRIS:  Because it is a disclosed document, and somebody
     3        may wish to check.
     4
     5   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  No.  You just tell someone, if you like.
     6        I am listening to evidence now, and that does not help me
     7        one bit with regard to this witness.
     8
     9   MR. MORRIS:  That was just for the court's information.
    10
    11   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, it proves absolutely nothing whatsoever.
    12
    13   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  There are two points in my interjection: the
    14        first is that it does not help me and it does not advance
    15        the case evidentially at all; the second is that it makes
    16        me very concerned that you think that it may have some
    17        evidential value when I do not think it does, and that you
    18        are leading yourself astray on that.  So there are both
    19        those aspects of anxiety as far as I am concerned.
    20
    MR. MORRIS:  As far as I understood it-----
    22
    23   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  You cannot not expect your opponent to go
    24        around checking everything which has been written or even a
    25        significant part of it.
    26
    27   MR. MORRIS:  As far as I understood, we have been asked by
    28        Mr. Rampton that, if we are referring to a document, to
    29        identify the document, even if it is only being used in
    30        cross-examination, so that he may want to check if that, in
    31        fact, is what the document says.  So I only thought it good
    32        practice.
    33
    34   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Quite frankly, I would leave it alone.  If
    35        you mention a source of something and Mr. Rampton is
    36        anxious to know what it is, I am sure he will ask.  So do
    37        not concern yourself.
    38
    39   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, can I just say, so that Mr. Morris
    40        understands, my feeling is rather the same as your
         Lordship's, that maybe it was that Mr. Morris (not
    42        Ms. Steel) thinks that because it is in a piece of paper it
    43        has some evidential value.  That is obviously not right.
    44
    45        So far as this particular form of cross-examination is
    46        concerned, I say, with respect, that Ms. Steel did get it
    47        right.  She puts the question.  The witness says:  "I do
    48        not know."  She does not take the course which she is
    49        entitled to take, which is to put the document in front of
    50        the witness and say:  "Do you adhere to your answer", if 
    51        she does not think it sensible to do.  She does not mention 
    52        any document; she does not have to.  She puts the question 
    53        directly.  That is the right way of going about it, if it
    54        is an admissible document, which plainly it is.
    55
    56   MS. STEEL:  I do not know that the motivations that Mr. Rampton
    57        is attributing to my actions were necessarily why I did not
    58        put the document.  I just did not put it.
    59
    60   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Whether by intention or accident -- and he is