1. CONTRACT LAW
At the end of this lecture you should have an understanding of:
- how contract law developed in England
- the essential ingredients of a contract
- judicial approaches to finding the existence of a contract

2. Common law – birth of contract law
Contract law developed through the courts of common law – the ‘writ’ system
Pickering v Thoroughgood 1533
General cause of action – assumpsit
Slade’s case 1602

3. Developments from the 16th to 19th centuries
Consideration
Industrial revolution
Principle of ‘laissez-faire’
Treatises on contract

4. 20th century developments
Problems with principle of ‘laissez-faire’
Judicial intervention in contracts
Statutory intervention in contracts

5. Definition of a contract
Is it possible?
Tentatively:
‘a legally binding agreement or set of promises between two or more parties’

6. Types of contract Simple or informal contracts
Contracts made under seal/deed

7. Simple contracts – how found?
‘An Englishman is liable, not because he has made a promise, but because he has made a bargain’
Chesire, Fifoot and Furmston’s
Law of Contract (14th edition) page 32

8. Job of the judge
When a case is brought to court the task of the judge is to determine OBJECTIVELY from all the evidence what was:
Said
Written
Done

9. External evidence
‘In contracts you do not look into the actual intent in a man’s mind. You look at what he said and did … a man cannot get out of contract by saying “I did not intend to contract” if by his words he has done so.’
Per Lord Denning in Storer v Manchester City Council 1974

10. Balancing interests
The judge has to balance the conflicting interests of ‘certainty’ and ‘fairness’
Contrasting cases:
Centrovincial Estates plc v Merchant Investors Assurance Co Ltd 1983
Hartog v Colin and Shields 1939

11. OFFER
An offer is:
‘an expression of a willingness to be legally bound as soon as this expression, by words or conduct, has been accepted by the party or parties to whom it was addressed’
Offeror Offeree

12. Hallmarks of a valid offer
For there to be an offer:
negotiations must be finished
the offer must be specific enough
the offer must be known to the offeree

13. Two contrasting cases Sudbrook Trading Estate Ltd v Eggleton 1983
Bushwall Properties Ltd v Vortex Properties Ltd 1976

14. Cross offers An offer is effective only when it is
communicated to the offeree
Thus, cross offers do not make a contract
Tinn v Hoffman and Co 1873

15. Difficult cases
‘English law, having committed itself to a rather technical and schematic doctrine of contract, in application takes a practical approach, often at the cost of forcing the facts to fit uneasily into the marked slots of offer, acceptance and consideration.’
Per Lord Wilberforce in New Zealand Shipping Co Ltd v Satterthwaite 1975

16. Clarke v Dunraven 1897
Merchant Shipping Act 1862
New Zealand Shipping Co Ltd v Satterthwaite 1975

17. Finding a valid offer Preliminary negotiations Advertisements
Goods on display in shops/catalogues
Auctions
Tenders

18. Preliminary negotiations
Gibson v Manchester City Council
1979

19. Contrasting case
Storer v Manchester City Council
1974

20. Use of the word ‘offer’
Bigg v Boyd Gibbons Ltd 1971

21. Advertisements Generally regarded as Invitations to Treat
Partridge v Crittenden 1968

22. Unilateral contracts Carlill v Carbolic Smoke Ball Co 1893
Bowerman v ABTA 1996

23. Goods on display in shops
Fisher v Bell 1961
Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain v Boots Cash Chemists (Southern Ltd) 1953

24. Auctions Payne v Cave 1979 Harris v Nickerson 1873
Barry v Heathcote Ball and Co (Commercial auctions) 2001

25. Tenders Spencer v Harding 1870
Blackpool & Flyde Aero Club Ltd v Blackpool Boro Council 1990
Harvela Investments v Royal Trust of Canada Ltd 1985