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Things witnesses in commercial disputes should know · Howes Percival Podcast

• speaker-0: Hello and welcome to the House Perceval podcast on things witnesses in commercial disputes should know. ⁓ My name is Gary Pitts. I'm a partner in the commercial dispute resolution team at House Perceval in Leicester and I'm joined today by Ali Tabari, a barrister and mediator at St Philip's Chambers in Birmingham. Ali's a barrister who specialises in commercial fraud and insolvency work, usually dealing with the fallout from businesses which have failed and often where directors are accused of dishonesty or serious misfeasance, serious stuff. He has been in practice for nearly 20 years and predominantly works in Birmingham and London. Ali says one of his most memorable moments involved losing a case to a farmer wearing a sheepskin rug on his head. So Ali, welcome. And my first question, obviously, is tell us about your formidable farming opponents. speaker-1: Thank you, Gary. might need a podcast just for that on its own. It's one of those stories where I think even if I become the Lord Chief Justice and King of the world, my mates will still remind me of this one. ⁓ like it was one of those humbling experiences about ten years ago. And to be fair, the guy was a a canny operator, but he was particularly upset at the fact that the judge he thought was listening more to us with our wigs and gowns than to him. So he brought along one of these sheepskin rugs that you'd find on the side of a fireplace and popped it on his head dutifully day in, day out. We had a good old chuckle, but we were ⁓ we were laughing on the other side of our face by the end of the trial, let's put it that way. Certainly was. speaker-0: ⁓ So we're here today to talk about witness evidence in civil trials, particularly I think in claims in the High Court or the multi-track of the county courts. What we plan to do I think is to set out what that means, what you'll need to know if you're going to be giving evidence, what happens at trial, everyone's always nervous about that step, and then some things that would be helpful to bear in mind as some tips if you're going to be called on to give that evidence. So think the first question really is why is witness evidence important? When you're at trial or in civil proceedings, Evidence can take three forms. You have your documents which are dealt with by disclosure. You may have expert evidence if there's certain questions that the witnesses themselves can't answer and the court think they need an expert in a certain area. And then a third is, and what we're here to talk today about is witness evidence. Right, so the courts treat all of those slightly differently. They don't need documents to experts and witnesses. speaker-1: Absolutely. In in the kind of cases that we're talking about in business and property courts, generally speaking, judges like to start by looking at the documents and particularly the contemporaneous ones that were created at the time of the events. ⁓ and they'll put a lot of weight on those documents, but sometimes those documents need explaining. Why did this come about? Why did you use that terminology? And that's where witness evidence comes in. speaker-0: And it's helpful because ⁓ documents are clearly the starting point, right? Because they record absolutely what happened at that snapshot in time. And when you look at witness evidence, you might not be giving your witness evidence until two or three years after proceedings were issued, never mind the actual events you're litigating on. So you may be seven, eight, nine years down the road and memories can fade, but documents are. are sort of irrefutable in that regard, but there is still a very important thing and everyone wants to be able to have the opportunity to tell their story as part of the litigation as well and that's where the context of witness evidence is really important, in setting the scene. speaker-1: Absolutely. I mean judges are judges get a lot of training these days about how the human memory works and how ⁓ human psyches work to slightly I I guess ⁓ unconsciously distort memories. Yeah. ⁓ and I think what you're alluding to there is the fact that if something happened in twenty eighteen and I'm being asked about it today, I'm gonna try and remember it as faithfully as I can. But inevitably, because I'm in a trial, I'm gonna put a bit of a spin on that. Whether whether I want to or not, my brain is gonna try and change things a little bit to make me look as good as possible. So judges do like to hear witness evidence, but some of the things we're gonna be talking about later about how to make it effective, how to make it trustworthy. ⁓ judges have always got in mind the fact that whenever you're giving evidence, whether you like it or not, your brain's gonna put a spin on your memories. speaker-0: And witness evidence doesn't start or end at trial, right? The first point to say is that you will do an awful lot of things before you get to trial. ⁓ Firstly is all the witnesses in civil proceedings should be giving a written statement. There are very few circumstances in which you don't do that. ⁓ You may even give some written evidence before that. You may be called upon to give a proof of evidence right at the start of proceedings if people need to take an assessment of what evidence will be available at trial. might ask a sort of an outline of that. But you give a witness statement in writing, and that's verified by a statement of truth, which is really important, right, because that sets out the honesty in what's being said. speaker-1: Absolutely. So it saves a lot of time in ⁓ in civil cases. So in criminal cases, someone will ask you questions and you'll you'll tell your story from the very outset. In in civil cases, what happens is of course you have your written witness statement. It's it's taken as read by the time you start the trial. So the judge will have had some time to to read that statement and understand that that's your evidence. But as you say, without the statement of truth, it means nothing. Because there you are saying to the court that whatever you've written down is is the best to your recollection and the best best of your knowledge, ⁓ what went on, the things that you saw and heard. ⁓ and it is it really important, of course, because the statement of truth has some teeth to it. If you put something in a written statement that you know isn't true, ⁓ you're liable to be held in contempt of court ⁓ later on, and that could be up to two years in prison or an unlimited fine. Now, very rarely does that actually come about. ⁓ But you just you need to know it's there. It's a it's a deadly serious part of the process. speaker-0: And I think it's important that people aren't scared of that when they prepare their witness statement. They need to make sure what they're saying is true. But if it's one of those things where when you get to trial, you think, actually, I've thought about this much more. And I remember actually it wasn't a Tuesday that happened. It was a weekend. I remember it being a weekend. One of the things you will get to do right at the outset is you will probably ask your witnesses that you're handling, is there anything now you've read your statement that doesn't ring true or that you might want to correct or any errors you've spotted? And there's an opportunity then to try to get out in front of those minor points. There's five minutes of minor points. your story totally changes, then that statement of truth might be much more relevant in terms of the teeth that it carries. speaker-1: Absolutely right. And and I think nobody nobody expects that to be ⁓ a lesson in perfection in the way that you ⁓ write your witness statement. You've got to try and do the best you can when you review it before you sign it. ⁓ but as you say, Gary, if you turn up on on the morning and you say that there's a few minor points that I'd like to change, no one's gonna mind that at all. speaker-0: Yeah, and it's quite common that those minor points come out as people start to put their mind more and more to things approaching trial. One of the other things that people may do before trial is they may go on something known as a witness familiarisation course. In England and Wales, what you cannot do is coach your witnesses. You can't say to them, by the way, you're going to be asked X, Y and Z questions and you should say A, B and C. The courts look very, very dimly on that and there will be sanctions if you do. But there are these familiarisation courses out there which are designed to help people with the process to understand what they're going to go through, get used to the idea of how they should answer those questions and also to try not to be so daunted by the process and the venue. What's your experience of dealing with witnesses who've been on those courses? speaker-1: been pretty positive. ⁓ you get some people who I think underestimate how difficult and stressful it is to give evidence, even if the evidence that you're giving is completely honest and based on your recollection, being in a courtroom environment is a an alien place to be. ⁓ and it is difficult. So these courses do have their uses. ⁓ as you say, you can't coach a witness, you can't say when you get asked this question you must give this answer and have to say if you ever find a lawyer who does that you need to turn the other way and run a mile. ⁓ What I sometimes find with these witness familiarisation courses is they sometimes teach you some pretty odd habits that then come out. ⁓ I remember having ⁓ a a trial where the other side's witnesses had has obviously been on witness familiarisation courses, and they started to develop this slightly strange tick where their barrister would ask them a question and then they would shift their whole body to look at the judge and say, My lord, my answer is and they did it every time. and it was really strange and the judge did cut them off after a couple of minutes and said, Can you stop doing that? You're just you're just answering questions to your barrister because you just look at them and do it normally. Speak normally, right? Yeah. Exactly. speaker-0: ⁓ The other thing I think is really important before trial is that people prepare for it. properly, the main thing I would say to a witness is go away and read your witness statement in real detail and all the documents that you exhibit to it as well. When you say in preparing your witness statement, I've read these documents in close behind it, make sure that you familiarise yourself with those as well before the trial so you know what you're likely to be asked, what you have said in the past, what your cross-examination is going to be based on so you've got that full picture. think that's probably the biggest tip in terms of preparation is knowing what you have said previously. speaker-1: Absolutely. And again, just like we said earlier, it's not a an exercise in perfection. You're not supposed to remember your lines word for word. ⁓ but it is really important that you get into the detail of your statement so that you're not taken by surprise with many questions. ⁓ I think what I would caveat that with though, is that the limits of your preparation as a witness ought to just be your witness statement and your exhibits. Sometimes it's really tempting, particularly if you're say the main witness in a in a case that involves a company that you're the director or shareholder of. You really want to get invested into it. There is a temptation to start going a little bit wider with your preparation, start reading everyone else's statements and so on. ⁓ I'd really caution against doing that because it's hard enough being a witness. ⁓ it's harder still when you try and insert yourself into the role of ⁓ an advocate and master strategist at the same time. speaker-0: We spoke earlier about the delay in proceedings from when you may be recording the events through to when that evidence is given. You may prepare your witness statement maybe six, maybe 12 months before you get to final trial as well. So it's important to just have that refresh and that checking back as well, isn't it? To make sure that you're consistent in what you remember and you would have put your minds to those issues when the statement was prepared. You want to just check back in and make sure that you remember as much as you can really heading into the trial process. speaker-1: Yeah, absolutely. And and you know, the more ⁓ credible detail that you can include the better. But we've all been there where you honestly recall something and then you realise later on that it was wrong. There's no problem with ⁓ changing those small details as you say though, as long as you're not shifting the fundamental bits of your case between witness statement and trial. speaker-0: Absolutely. And the other thing I think it's important to do before trial, this may seem like a minor point, it's surprising how often it comes up, is really checking the logistics of what's happening. If a trial is listed for eight days, for example, which day or days are you likely to be giving your witness evidence on? Don't presume that you're going to be later on in the week when you might be up on day two or day three. You want to make sure that you've got all those things covered off. And you also want to make sure that you are appearing in person, not remotely via, you know, ⁓ Cpp or teams or zoom or whatever it might be all these sorts of things may seem really minor but on the morning of a Day one of a trial your witnesses that's going to be the things that are playing in their mind Which quarter we and where are we going? What am I doing? Where am I parking? What am I how am I getting there? Who am I meeting at trial all these sorts of things you want to make sure that you've just got fathomed out before you go So it's one less thing to worry about on the day speaker-1: Yeah, there's no silly questions. ⁓ you've you know, if you've hired lawyers, you've got to ask them all of these things. Th I I made a rookie error in the first year or two ⁓ of my career. ⁓ we didn't go through these details with with a client who was due to be giving evidence in a in a very involved case. And ⁓ we told him to dress smart and he came ⁓ no word of a lie, he he turned up in a tuxedo with a cumabund. but he also hadn't realised that he was likely to give evidence for more than one day. And he ended up giving evidence for four days. And he ha he hadn't packed so much as a toothbrush to ⁓ to come to London. So on day four, that tuxedo was looking pretty ragged, I have to say. And we were all keeping a bit of a distance. And it w that was on us. We should have we should have had the conversation with. speaker-0: But it's easy logistics that happens to the best of us, I remember as a much more junior lawyer going to a hearing at the, I think it was a countercourt in Northampton and being caught up by the one way system and having driven past the courts on about four separate occasions before I finally realised where I could get out and park. that's half an hour that you don't need when you've already got everything else playing on your mind about what's about to happen and the process and all the rest of it. So you really want to get that as smooth as you can and prepare ahead of time. So next point then really is the trial, what happens to the witnesses at trial. Everyone has an assumption about what happens, generally based off having watched TV, ⁓ generally based off having watched American TV as well. absolutely. I've never seen a surprise witness called in at the last minute and heralded through the public gallery. The first thing to say is that your evidence is, like your written witness statement, is given under oath. So that means you are sworn in at the start of your evidence. How does that process work? What happens? speaker-1: So there's there's two ways of doing it. If you want to ⁓ swear on a a holy book of some sort, that's absolutely fine. If if you are agnostic or don't want to swear on a holy book, that's absolutely fine as well. You know, to to any judge that doesn't really matter. It's just what what binds your conscience is the way that they put it. So you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. You confirm the contents of your witness statements, subject to any minor alterations that you might make. And then unless there's any other questions that you're barrister wants to ask you in addition to your statement, which is pretty rare event, generally you then sit there and wait for the other side's barrister to start asking you questions. And that's really the ⁓ the fun of it all, ⁓ which is cross-examination. speaker-0: Yeah, cross-examination is really the key to witness evidence at trial, isn't it? It's the point where the other side's argument is put to a witness and those difficult questions are confronted. So how should you as a witness ⁓ handle cross-examination and what should you expect? speaker-1: Well, I think there are two big things that I would always say to any witnesses on on my side of a trial, ⁓ and the first of those is to remember your role. So when you're a witness, it sounds a bit silly, but you are just a witness. You're just saying what you saw and what you heard and what you did. Not what you would have done, could have done, should have done, thought you might have done, and so on. It's really just testing your recollection of things that you were party to. And sometimes it as I said before, it's really tempting when you're involved in in great detail in the litigation to try and go a little bit further and give tactical answers and try and sort of joust with ⁓ the barrister on the other side. It's a really bad thing to do because ultimately what the judge wants to hear is your evidence of what you actually saw and heard. Yeah. And that is it. And I always say to my witnesses, look, I I sometimes wish I could jump into your chair. And give what I think are the right answers, but I can't. So I can't step on your toes. Please don't step on mine. So I think that's the first thing to remember about that. I've seen cases in the past which have been completely blown apart by witnesses overstepping the mark and just basically irritating the judge. The second is to answer the questions that you have in fact been asked. The temptation is to answer the question that you wish you'd been asked. speaker-0: You've got to... all the time, don't you? speaker-1: You've got such a good answer to that question, but it's just not the question that's actually been asked of you. ⁓ I I mean I've had people where who who haven't accepted what ⁓ the definition of telling a lie is. You know, they they wouldn't accept that simply because I'm on the other side and I'm putting it to them. I've had someone who's written a a document and they've signed it off and they simply won't accept that that was actually a document that they had written simply because I'm asking the question. So they're trying to be combative. And they try to just ⁓ as I say, be tactical about what they what they say. It's really important to remember that judges are human beings. So they can get annoyed, but they also want to make decisions that they're comfortable with. And judges really have only got a day with you as a witness. They see you for the first time when you go into the box, and then that's it. Once you depart, it's all over. So you haven't got a great deal of time to make a big impression with them. One thing you need to come across as is trustworthy and someone who's prepared to basically play by the rules, answer the question, don't overstep your mark, and then leave. speaker-0: And I think they're very suspicious when you see sort of the politicians answer, where you've already got your prepared answer you're going to give, come what may. Whatever question it is, these are the talking points. This is what I'm going to say. You might ask me a question about that, but I will find any way within my power to steer it around to the thing I'm really keen to say. And I think that actually loses you credibility quite quickly. And it actually seems to undercut the value of a lot of your other evidence, because I think judges tend to see, well, you're just here to deliver the message you've decided you're delivering. You're not assisting the court as you're role actually is in that relationship, you're on a sort of single track to get your story across. speaker-1: Absolutely. Giving evidence is I always think trial generally is a game of one percent. Small gains here and there, small defeats here and there are going to make the difference because most open and shut cases are not going to go to trial. So everything that goes to trial and requires live evidence is in that grey area where it could go either way. So what you don't want to do is lose those cheap one percent by coming across as untrustworthy to a judge, as being awkward, as being someone that the judge quite frankly doesn't want to find for. speaker-0: Yeah, I think the other thing that witnesses often worry about is what if the opposing counsel really starts to barricade, won't let a point go. And actually, I think it's important to note there that the judge can step in if he thinks the question is going too far. And your counsel may well step in and intervene if they have an issue with a line of questioning that's being taken. So as a witness, that sort of managing the trial process and managing the questions, that's out of your hands. And you're better to focus on what you're doing rather than getting worried about that. trust that the judge or counsel will step in and stop anything if you think it's going too far, or it's strayed wildly off topic, or they're trying to set a trap that's hopelessly unfair, you all those things will be dealt with out of your hands. You focus on what you do. speaker-1: Doing. That's absolutely right. And basically everything that you've ever seen on TV about cross-examination you can just ignore because we we in in our system in England and Wales, we don't stand for rudeness to witnesses, we don't stand for the kind of badgering that reduces people to tears. In the end we're talking about business and property dis disputes. No one's generally going to prison as a result of all of this. And judges will enforce really strongly ⁓ a code of behaviour. And all the barristers involved in any case have a a code of behaviour that they have to abide by anyway. ⁓ so you're not going to be taken for a ride, you're not going to be treated unfairly, you're not going to be shouted out of court. But as long as you do your bit and answer the question that's in front of you with a straight answer, then you're going to be fine. speaker-0: then once you've been cross-examined what tends to happen is there's a period of re-examination which is where your side's counsel will get up and ask any questions that have followed on from that cross-examination where they might want to try to get things back on track as they expected them to be or try to ask some questions to frame things in a more helpful manner. Is there anything that witnesses should know about that re-examination process? speaker-1: I think generally speaking, I try not to re-examine if possible, 'cause it does rather tend to suggest that there's ⁓ a mess there that you need to clear up. ⁓ but I think, you know, just along the same lines, you you just gotta resist the temptation to think if you're being re-examined, I must have got something wrong. Quick, you know, row back, say the one hundred and eighty degree opposite thing to what I've just said. That's not helpful. I think if you can just try and sort of remain calm, if you're being re-examined you've got a friendly voice asking you the the questions and they're gonna ask you questions that they know you're gonna give a a decent answer to. speaker-0: And it may well be that you've given evidence for a long period of time. might be a day, it might be more than a day, it might be a significant period of time. Re-examination may also be an opportunity just to tease out those threads that have been lost earlier back in the evidence because it was three days ago. But you want to get that front and centre, so you might want to ask a question that opens that back up and just pulls it forward again so it puts in a better framing or gets it to the front of people's minds. It's not necessarily you've done something wrong, it's just there was a lot of information there. Here's a chance to focus on a key. speaker-1: point. That's absolutely right. And then within that same process, the judge can ask you some questions as well. Of course the judge can ask you questions along the way whenever they like, but they tend to try and take a backseat, wait until the barristers have done their questioning, and then maybe throw in some more of their own. So sometimes ⁓ re-examination might just be a way of getting ahead of a question that you think, ⁓ the judge probably is going to ask about that. speaker-0: Sometimes they take a backseat. I think I've seen some cross-examination. It was like a double act at times. Some of them are more involved than others. And one thing that's helpful to mention here as well, and is quite confusing for witnesses, is there's a rule for witnesses known as perda, which means that if you're a witness and you are sworn in, at the end of that day or at the lunch break in the hearing, whatever it may be, Your side cannot speak to you in terms of your evidence, right? They might be able to ask you questions about what time you need to be there tomorrow, those sort of purely logistical things, but you're not going to have the opportunity to go and instruct your solicitors further on points. You're really sort of tied away from the cause at that point. You're held away. can't be, like I say, asked questions that you might expect taken to further bits of evidence. It would be helpful if you remember tomorrow any of that. You are on your own from that point on. speaker-1: Yeah, it's I think that's the hardest part of giving evidence actually, from what I've seen of witnesses. If you if your evidence finishes after a court day is finished, so you've got a bit of your cross examination remaining by the time you get to 430 and you've got to come back tomorrow and finish it, your head's swimming with all of these ideas and all of the stress that you've had, and then the very people that you're paying to help you can only talk to you about the football or the weather or something like that. ⁓ but it is so, so important that you stick to it because I've seen it too many times where a witness will come back ⁓ for ten thirty the next morning and say, ⁓ I just want to correct an answer that I gave yesterday and they start telling you telling the judge about ⁓ some other matter that apparently has just popped into their minds and y you quickly realise it's because they've been talking to somebody about it. speaker-0: I think it's really important if you're a witness as well to know that the reason you're not being spoken to by your solicitor is not because you've got it wrong or that they don't like you anymore or you're of no more use to them. We finished with you, off you go. It's because that's what the rules require. had a hearing recently where one of our witnesses gave evidence over two days. couldn't speak to him afterwards. As we all left the court, we said sort of pleasantries and he asked, ⁓ how did I do? And obviously we can't answer that question. So we said nothing and he... really thought then that we were annoyed with him, that he got it wrong, and it sort of became quite tense for that period. We had given him the advice about Perda, but in the course of everything that had gone on, that was not front of his mind. So it was slightly awkward interaction, but it's something that think witnesses need to be aware of. speaker-1: Absolutely. ⁓ and as I say, given that this is a a game of one percent, you don't want to lose your one percent by coming back the next day and making the judge think that you've ignored their warning about the perder. speaker-0: No, absolutely. ⁓ So over your 20 years of experience, you must have seen some pretty interesting witnesses, some pretty interesting issues arising when cross-examining and things like that. Are there any that stick out to you? speaker-1: Do you know, I think the the one that really sticks in my mind is is going back to those two points earlier about answering the straight question with a straight answer and also not overstepping a role. And that it was a horrible family dispute, the kind the kind of thing that you would never want to be caught up in. But it was very bitter on both sides. But the main witness on the other side who I think was that was the nephew of the claimant. He'd really taken it upon himself to drive the litigation, to really try and influence the witnesses on his side and so on. And he massively overstepped his mark because he started making legal arguments in answer to the questions that I had asked him. Really some easy preparatory questions about, you know, when he'd got into the property, w when was the first time he remembers having a conversation with his uncle about this type of thing. And he starts talking about, well, obviously this gave rise to a constructive trust in my mind and all the rest of it. And I thought, ⁓ you're in trouble here because we had a really grumpy judge, really notoriously grumpy judge, who just said to him, that's very interesting, Mr. So and so. Now, in your mind, was this a restitutionary constructive trust? Or was it a remedial constructive trust? And how did it come about? And what are the what do you say the proprietary aspects of this? And the judge knew exactly what he was doing. He was trying to give this witness a good humbling to say, stay in your lane. But from then on, it was a complete uphill struggle for the guy. And it did, as I say, I think it just brought home to me that even though I hadn't really done anything about this, I just set the hair running and and and he'd taken it on from there. It was when the judge made it completely clear to say, I just want you to be a witness. If you're gonna play at being a lawyer, I'll put you through the ring of that way as well. It was a bit cruel. But I thought it was quite a good ⁓ demonstration of w why you really should try and stick to your maximum speaker-0: the point, doesn't it? Yeah. I mean, I remember having a trial showing my age in the Nightingale Courts post-COVID, where we were called to a trial in a hotel ⁓ sort of function room, which was hastily set up as ⁓ a courtroom and having a situation there where one of our witnesses said so many things that weren't in his witness statements, despite having been asked to prepare them, that were manifestly unhelpful to our case, that we really thought, ⁓ we're in trouble here. But when it came to the handing down of the judgment, the judge said something that seemed totally conscious, I said, actually, he was willing to make so many concessions that were massively unhelpful to his case. The fact that he stayed with the central thread of it the whole way through actually demonstrated the honesty in that point. know, these other points he conceded seemed that they might have conflicted with the central line running through it. But the judges said, look, it actually shows us his honesty. Anyone who was willing to mislead the court would have tried to avoid all those other concessions he made and just said, you know, in furtherance of my point, you know, tying it back to that. But sometimes making those concessions and demonstrating your honesty is where the real power is and where we thought, I can see how this would, this might sit with the judge. Actually, the judge was really impressed by that evidence, which was extremely helpful. speaker-1: You know, I love I actually love it when my witnesses say things like, I don't know, or I can't remember. That is such a good thing to do because it's it is honest, it is open, it is willing to be i in a sense, ⁓ vulnerable to not knowing everything. And that's okay because nobody knows everything. Nobody can remember everything. I'm more worried by the people who say, I remember it like it was yesterday, even though it was twenty fifteen. You know, no no human memory works like that. So, ⁓ I I think it's a great demonstration, isn't it, of actually if you're just open and honest with the court about things, generally speaking, bearing in mind there is a human sat there, they might be a judge, but they are still a human, they're more likely to want to find for you if they think that you're not trying to pull the wall over their eyes. speaker-0: The witness who has an answer to everything is the one that you're often most suspicious of. ⁓ So as we sort of look to wrap this up Ali, what would your three tips to someone who's about to be called on to give witness evidence in a civil matter be? What three things should they focus on? speaker-1: Well at the danger of being a broken record, the first two are what I've said before. One is very much stay in your lane, remember you're a witness. ⁓ the second is to just put the blinkers on and answer the question that's directly in front of you, rather than thinking, ⁓ in three questions time he's gonna ask me this. ⁓ don't do that. Just answer the thing that's right there. And the third one really just touches on the point that we made there. I I what I always say to my witnesses before they give evidence is at the end of trial, I want to be able to say in a closing speech to a judge That this was a witness who came to court to help the court, not just to help themselves. So be open, be honest, and actually trust the system, because one little misstep is very unlikely to cost you anything. But I think a bit of openness, a bit of humility goes a long way in ⁓ making sure that the judge finds you credible. speaker-0: That's the key point, right, credibility. what we want. Thank you, Ali. Thank you for joining us for the Howes Percival podcast. ⁓ I've been your host, Gary Pitts, our guest Ali Tabari from St Philip's Chambers. Thank you, Ali. You can follow us on LinkedIn for further information and our contact details and the details of Ali's Clarking team will be in the description for this episode. Thank you very much. Goodbye.