Day 237 - 18 04 96 - Page 59

     1
     2   MS. STEEL:   Could we ask through the court whether or not the
     3        Plaintiffs have now got them altogether, because they had
     4        not the last time I asked.
     5
     6   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   I was urging they do, they be got together.
     7        What I suggest is, when I rise, you have a word with Mr.
     8        Hill and try and find out from him what the situation is.
     9
    10   MR. RAMPTON:   My Lord, I do not know.
    11
    12   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   Or ring Mrs. Brinley-Codd first thing in the
    13        morning or ask Mr. Hill if he will enquire of you and ring
    14        back.
    15
    16   MR. RAMPTON:  My Lord, can I say one more thing about
    17        Miss Watson's evidence really arising out of what your
    18        Lordship said now?  I made the observation that a good deal
    19        of her material is in Portuguese.  Quite apart from the
    20        fact that I do not read Portuguese, the proceedings in this
    21        court must be conducted in English which the Defendants
    22        well know since the time at least of Mr. Lamti.  I am not
    23        happy to sit in court while Miss Watson ploughs through
    24        these documents giving your Lordship a translation.  Some
    25        of them are quite long and I dare say they are quite
    26        technical too.  You cannot possibly tell.
    27             I make that observation because I believe it speaks
    28        for itself really.  Even the map to which Mr. Morris
    29        referred me just now has a legend which I can partly
    30        decipher, but again it is in Portuguese.  Really, it is the
    31        obligation of the party who wants to give either oral or
    32        documentary evidence in a foreign language to have it
    33        translated in a form which the court and the other side can
    34        follow.
    35
    36   MR. MORRIS:   She is going to speak in English.
    37
    38   MR. RAMPTON:  I understand that, but if she is going rely on
    39        documents which are in a foreign language, they must be
    40        translated.
    41
    42   MS. STEEL:   I seem to remember Mr. Cesca referring and
    43        translating some parts of -----
    44
    45   MR. JUSTICE BELL:   We were trying to puzzle it out.  It may be
    46        that with legends under tables in articles, it will be all
    47        rights.
    48
    49   MR. MORRIS:   I am sure she does not intend to translate the
    50        whole lot from the witness box. 
    51 
    52   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  No, the bottom line is that ultimately one 
    53        can object and say one cannot just have translations from
    54        the witness box when one does not know what is going to be
    55        translated and what is not, and one does not have one's own
    56        translator here.  The only proper way of conducting the
    57        litigation is to have an agreed translation in advance.
    58             I am not going to get hot under the collar about it
    59        now because I hope we can avoid any problem about it, but
    60        if there is more than the odd legend under a table in an
 
                                      59