It is commonly accepted that an estoppel is a legal doctrine which prevents a person from negating or claiming a fact due to that person’s prior conduct. The doctrine of estoppel has been applied for years and different forms of estoppel have been established. For the purpose of this essay, I will predominantly concentrate on promissory estoppel in relation to the law of contracts. This essay will be approached by discussing the issues of pre-contractual liability, consideration, reliance and the doctrine as a cause of action or defence and a slight comparison of the standpoints that various jurisdictions hold towards these issues. These arguments would conclude the uncertainty of the doctrine and thus, the difficulty and issues that would be faced with the codification of the estoppel. Promissory Estoppel In the 19th century, promissory estoppel was first introduced in Hughes v Metropolitan Railway Co , where Lord Cairns ruled that parties who have entered into fixed terms and then afterwards, by their own act or will, enter negotiations which influence the other party to assume that the stringent rights that were originally imposed will not be enforced or will be deferred, should be unable to reverse from this if it is inequitable for them to do so. This doctrine was resurrected by Lord Denning in Central London Property Ltd v High Trees House Ltd , where he expanded on the doctrine of promissory estoppel and ruled that where there is a promise intended to form legal relations and the promisor knew it would be acted upon and it was acted upon by the promisee then the promise made would be binding even with a lack of consideration. Conditions of Promissory Estoppel Promissory estoppel has now developed to require three main con... ... middle of paper ... ...aw in the US and Australia where the doctrine can be used to found a cause of action to remedy the non-performance of a promise unsupported by consideration. In the UK however, it is a means where contractual rights may be suspended, but not by which new rights can be formed. In the US, where the doctrine can be used as a cause of action and has been used in multiple cases, commentators have claimed that the doctrine is a ‘flexible means of achieving fairness’ and ‘cannot be reduced to a precise formula or series of tests’ . Conclusion Due to the various strands of arguments and its limited scope of application today, the doctrine has vague areas which need to be resolved before codification is possible. The strength of the doctrine lies in the courts ability to award the defence based on the facts of the case and codification would need to achieve this fluidity.
A promissory estoppel is present if one party makes a promise to the other knowing that the other will rely on it. If the other party relies on it, there would be an injustice if the promise was not enforced. In the case of Sam and the chain store, unless the chain store had already paid him and/or spent money in anticipation of the arrival of the 1000 units, promissory estoppel would not be present since they did not rely on Sam’s promise. However, since the text reads that the chain store wrote a letter to Sam demanding that the 1000 units be sent, it implies that they had relied upon that
The courts are currently limited by the doctrine and are thus unable to protect the rights and liberty of those who deserve remedies. The UK, being primarily of modernity in regard to their legal approach could be argued as quite different to Australia and thus in rebuttal to that position, one would argue even New Zealand, another Australasian country has moved towards and abolished Advocates Immunity. In the case of Chamberlains v Lai New Zealand’s highest court chose to abolish Advocates Immunity, thus moving New Zealand towards a more just and modernist
In support of this conclusion, the court cited the reasoning of Williams, emphasising the independence of the right of contribution amongst co-sureties from any present rights of a creditor. In further support, the court considered the specific nature of covenants not to sue, noting that they are not intended to discharge liability, so as to not release all co-guarantors, but rather to prevent any enforceability through legal proceedings. The court resultantly concluded that the covenant not to sue did not extinguish, but in fact assumed the continued existence of the appellants’ and respondents’ shared coordinate liabilities, entitling the respondents to recover
The law of contract in many legal systems requires that parties should act in good faith. English law refuses to impose such a general doctrine of good faith in the field of contract law. However, despite not recognizing the principle, English contract law is still influenced by notions of good faith. As Lord Bingham affirmed, the law has developed numerous piecemeal solutions in response to problems of unfairness. This essay will seek to examine the current and future state of good faith in English contract law.
Lord Denning described estoppel succinctly as ‘a principle of justice and equity. It comes to this: when a man, by his words or conduct, has led another to believe in a particular state of affairs, he will not be allowed to go back on it when it would be unjust or inequitable for him to do so’ . Proprietary estoppel in turn is an informal method by which proprietary rights can arise. It can provide a defence to an action by a landowner who seeks to enforce his strict rights against someone who has been informally promised some right or liberty over the land. In turn it can be used as a defence or a cause of action. In order to show how the two doctrines are quite similar, a description of the elements of proprie...
(18) It should be noted that Western Law is deeply divided between Anglo-American and Continental European tradition. Nevertheless I shall not touch this division in the paper, which deals most of all with the philosophical aspect of the problem for which both of them are very close.
Based on common law and precedent, the English law of contract has been formulated and developed over a number of years with it’s primary purpose to provide a regulated framework within which individuals can contract freely. In order to ensure a contract is enforceable there are certain elements which must be satisfied, one of which is the doctrine of consideration. Lord Denning famously professed; “the doctrine of consideration is too firmly fixed to be overthrown by a side wind” . This is a crucial indication that consideration has long been regarded as the cardinal ‘badge of enforceability’ in the formulation and variation of contracts in English common law.
HILLIARD, J. And O’SULLIVAN, J. (2012) The Law of Contract [Online] 5th Ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Available from - http://books.google.co.uk/ [Accessed: 2nd January 2014]
This is where the individuals exercise their rights to seek compensations for damages or injuries. Also this is a law that is not controlled by the judges based on previous things that had happen in the past.
Both the common law and the statutory law have recognized the weaker position of consumers. It is well established an exclusion clause will be valid and enforceable only if it is incorporated in the contract, use clear wordings and does not contravene statutory limits. In order to limit the unfairness resulting from exclusion clauses, the courts have developed certain principles such as the doctrine of non est factum in signature cases, ‘red ink-red hand’ principle in relation to ‘onerous or unusual’ terms, contra proferentem rule when interpreting ambiguous exclusion clauses and ‘fundamental breach’ principle.
The Doctrine of Proportionality is a general concept in law which is used to ensure the presence of fairness and justice in statutory interpretation processes. First enunciated in the High State Administrative Courts in Germany in the late 19th century to review the actions of the police, this doctrine has its application in several branches of law. For instance, in Constitutional law, it keeps a balance between the restriction imposed by a corrective measure and the severity of the nature of the prohibited act. Within Criminal Law,
The common law doctrine of res gestae was first circumscribed definitively in the case of R v Bedingfield. The principal test to determine the admissibility
When at the desire of the promisor, the promise or any other person has done or abstained from doing, or does or abstains from doing, or promises to do or abstain from doing something, such act or abstinence or promise is called a consideration for the promise, is how consideration is defined according to Section 2(d) of Contracts Act 1950. Without consideration a contract will not occur. Therefore, it is very vital for consideration to exist to form a contract. Consideration is related to a Latin phrase “Quid Pro Quo” which means a party gives or receives something in return for something the other party gives. This means, for a contract to be valid… Examples of consideration include money, promise to act, promise to abstain from acting, services and many more.
The existence of a formal contract formed by both parties, in the event of a dispute, economic loss allegedly caused by the professional’s negligence, the doctrine of privity of contracts will apply. The most significant case of Tweddle v. Atkinson.[1861] discloses that the bride’s father and the groom’s father entered into an agreement which would pay the couple a sum of money. Both parties died without having paid and the groom made a claim against the executor of the will. The court held that the groom was not a party to the agreement and hence he is not entitled to enforce the contract. Therefore, this case illustrate the principle of privity of contract, which implies that only a promisee may enforce the rights and obligations promised
The old common law had a doctrine of absolute contract under which contractual obligations were binding no matter what might occur (Paradine v Jane, 1647). In order to ease the hardship which this rule caused in cases where the contract could not be properly fulfilled through no fault of either party but due to occurrence of unforeseen events, the doctrine of frustration was developed.