ABSTRACT
In the late 1980s, near the beginning of my research on local environmental issues, I attended a Public Inquiry in the village of Killyleagh in Northern Ireland. Killyleagh is on the shore of Strangford Lough, a sea inlet which is one of Northern Ireland’s most important areas for nature conservation. The purpose of the Inquiry was to hear objections to a proposal to construct a yachting marina in Killyleagh Harbour. Although the harbour was not, in itself, seen as particularly important for wildlife, its mud-flats, exposed at low tide, provided food for wading birds. Public inquiries in the UK tend to have an adversarial character. It is common practice for parties on both sides to employ lawyers to present their case and cross-examine their opponents’ witnesses. Not surprisingly, some of the techniques employed in cross-examination are designed to undermine the credibility of the witnesses in order to weaken their case. One of the peculiarities of Northern Ireland’s political system at the time was that the government department which took decisions on development proposals was also responsible for environmental protection. On this occasion, an official of that department was being cross-examined by the developer’s legal representative on the importance of the mud-flats in Killyleagh Harbour. In the midst of his questioning, without pause and immediately before moving on to his next question, the legal representative made what might have appeared to be a casual remark: ‘You seem to be in love with mud-flats.’ In fact, it was a very clever comment which invoked the tacit understanding that feelings are
not a sound basis for making decisions about development proposals. What he implicitly said was:
As a government official charged with making such decisions, you should not be swayed by your feelings. Since you clearly are swayed by your feelings, you must be an incompetent government official and therefore an unreliable witness in this case.
