Doctrine of Judicial Precedent
Ans1.
- The Act of Parliament has been described as the new law or any alteration in the existing law of the country. In other words, it can also be defined as the primary legislation passed by the legislative bodies. In most countries, the bill is recognized as the primary stage of the Act of parliament(UK legislation, 2022). An Act in its premature stage has been defined as a bill which when approved by both the houses of the parliament are the house of commons and the house of lords and gains royal assent by the monarch becomes Act. In the UK the statute law has been defined as the Act of the parliament. It is necessary to form the Acts of parliament as it helps in enforcing new laws after being passed by the government. Moreover, in order to repeal any law of the parliament, it is required to pass another Act or delegated legislation (UK parliament , 2022).
- The legal principles that are been developed through judicial decisions are known as case laws. In other words, the legal principles that have been made by the courts were decided by the judges in the court of law. These are the primary sources of law. Thus, case laws are originated from the combination of the opinion of the court to interpret and apply the law to the individual cases(UK Libraries, 2021). Case laws are helpful in understanding the guidelines regarding specific regulation. Additionally, the guidelines defined by the court and their application to a case have been understood by analyzing the case laws (Mitchell, 2016).
The doctrine of judicial precedent states that the judges in the subordinate courts are bound by the principles or decisions previously formed by the higher court. However, the judicial precedent has been based upon the stare decisis which is the Latin term stands for to stand by cases already decided (Kozel, 2014). Precedents are based upon the principle of ratio decidenti which defines the reason behind the case decision based upon the facts and figures. The advantage of the doctrine of judicial precedent is that it provides inevitability and probability. However, the principle of stare decisis is based on rigidity and incapacity of the common law in terms of changing moral, socio-economic, and political certainties present in the inert body of law. This has been described in London Tramways Co. Ltd v. London County Council [1898] AC 375 (Martin, 2014). However, there are many disadvantages related to the judicial precedents like it is very rigid, bulky, and complex, risk of illogical distinctions. Moreover, in the case where there are no precedents in a particular case then the judge faces some problems while deciding the case. The major difference between the doctrine of stare decisis and judicial precedent is that state decisis defines the last decision of the case whereas the judicial precedent defines the rulings of the cases which are then decided on the bases of the past decisions of the court. Thus stare decisis in the narrow sense helps the judges to reduce the uncertainty that occurs in making the decisions (Waldron, 2012). With this doctrine, judges can observe their past decisions and the results on which the other judges have reached for a similar case. Some circumstances occur where the higher court forms new precedents or might alter the previous precedents made on appeal thus in this way it is not necessary that the court follow the judicial precedent.
Termination of offer according to the contract law described as the cessation of offer before the opposite party that is the offeree could accept or reject the same. For a contract to be valid there needs to be some kind of offer by one party and acceptance by another one. The party who presents an offer is known as the offeror whereas the other accepting party is known as the offeree. In a general sense, the offeror makes an offer to the offeree with clear terms of the contract (Stone, 2017). It is the duty of the offeree to check and review the terms of the contract stated and then respond to the offeror by accepting or rejecting it. The situation in which the offeree accepts the terms of the contract is observed as the performance of the contract. Contract termination is different from the termination of the offer as while terminating the offer there was no full performance of the contract. This termination of offer ends the power of the offeror to perform. The most important aspect of termination of the offer is that it ends before the offeree could do something about the offer (O’Sullivan, 2020). Thus either the party’s or the legal actions could terminate the offer. The first way is through rejection. This could be observed when the offeree expressly communicates the non-acceptance of the offer to the offeror. The second way to terminate the offer is related to the lapse of time. After making an offer, the offeree is given sufficient time to respond to the offer, however, if the offeree does not respond in the given time then it is regarded as terminated. Death, incapacitation, or disability can also be regarded as the major reason for the termination of an offer. Sometimes counter offer can also be seen as the way to terminate the original offer for instance in Hyde v. Wrench (UNISON, 2022). If the consideration stated in the offer becomes illegal or is illegal then automatic termination of the offer can take place. Besides all these ways of termination, termination by law is another way to end the offer. If any alteration takes place in the law before the offeree accepts the offer then the offer is terminated by law as it might become a void contract. Another way to terminate the offer relates to the destruction of the subject matter before the other party accepts the offer.
Termination of Offer in Contract Law
The law applied in the above case study is the contract Law. There are certain elements of the contract law like offer, acceptance, consideration, objective to create legal relations, capacity to become party to the contract, and certainty of the contract (Savelyev, 2017). The offer in the contract has been defined as the proposal that states the terms and conditions for a party to enter into the legal agreement with the other party. Acceptance in the contract relates to the agreement towards the specific terms and conditions of the contract stated in the offer. The acceptance of the offer must be communicated through conduct; any silence to the offer does not amount to acceptance. For instance, as observed in Felthouse v. Bindley. Moreover, it must be unconditional also as seen in Tinn v. Hoffman (Bits of law, 2012). In the above case study, the proper offer has been made by the Southbank leisure center to the public at large through flyers. The flyer stated about the special offer for the New Year that gave the offer to the local residents to join the gym without any administration charges. Moreover, if any local resident wants to join the membership then he or she has to provide an address proof like council tax payment letter, statement of bank, and TV license payment letter as stated in the offer which is in the form of a flyer. Two local residents Mary and Hannah accepted the offer which states that if they apply for its membership before 31st January then they would get premier membership for £120 which is the same price as off-peak membership. Additionally, they would get a free sports bag if they join the special offer. Thus both of them went to the office and filled out the form for the membership on 30th January thus accepting the offer through conduct. After analyzing the case study it can be concluded that all the essential elements of the contract have been taken into consideration thus making the contract legal.
The concept of intention to create a legal contract came into existence in the 19th century. The phrase intention to create legal relations relate to the intention of the party to enter into the contract which is also known as a legally binding agreement that defines the rights and obligations of the parties to the contract that are enforceable. If someone becomes the party to an agreement and does not have an intention to create legal intention then it is not considered as the contract (Levi Solicitors, 2017). However, if an agreement has valid consideration but is not legally binding then also it is not recognized as the contract. This concept has been defined in the Balfour v. Balfour case which stated that an agreement between the parties constituting the contract has the intention to come into a legal relationship with one another except for any agreement between the spouse. In order to find out the intention of the parties, an objective test has been applied instead of just asking about the intent of the party to create a contract. For instance, as observed in Carlill v. Carbolic Smoke Ball Company where the court held that the parties to the contract were bounded by the legal intention to create a contract as the company has deposited £1000 in the bank to show some genuineness (e-law resources, 2022). According to the case study of Mary and Hannah, there was legal intention to create a contract. Both the women have thoroughly analyzed the conditions written in the flyer for getting membership in the leisure center. The flyer stated the consideration that is £120 for local residents and £180 for non-local residents which defined the intention on the part of the leisure center to come into a legal relationship with the residents who apply for the membership. In the second part when the women have analyzed the flyer which is the acceptance of the offer made, they went to the gym and signed and filled the form that is required to get the membership stated in the flyer. This shows that the offeree has the intention to create the legal relation.
Case Study
The concept of consideration was taken from other common law jurisdictions. Consideration has been defined as something of value which has been given by either party as a quid pro quo to bargain in a contract. In a legal sense, something that has value in the eyes of law has been defined as consideration (Lewinsohn, 2019). It is the most important feature to make a contract as it makes the contract legally binding. In the contact law, it has been observed that consideration moves from promise to the promisor as the promisor already has made a promise sufficient to form a contract. Thus after getting a promise from the promisor, now the promise has to give his or her consideration in the form of acceptance of the promise to form a legally binding contract. A promise can be recognized as the consideration in some contract where the parties agree to do or abstain from doing some act or the parties to the contract agree to pay monetary value for something. There are two types of consideration first is executed where the contract has been performed within the meaning of the contract whereas the second type is executor where the act is not performed as promised. For instance, observed in Lucy v. Walwyn where the loss of bargaining resulted in the recovery of damages by the plaintiff (McBain, 2018). If the consideration is of small value then also it is sufficient to form a valid consideration as well as to legally bind the parties to the contract as stated in Thomas v. Thomas where the widow got court held that £1 which was enough for her to live in her house thus making it valid consideration while contracting. According to the above case study, it has been observed that the consideration has been stated by the Southbank Leisure Centre for the local residents to be £120 and for non-local residents, it was £180. Both the women, Mary and Hannah are residents of Southbank thus to get the New Year special offer they have to pay £120. In Hendrickson v. Meredith 161 Va. 193 (1933) the difference between the implied and expressed contracts has been stated. According to the case the major difference between the expressed and implied contacts are that in expressed contracts the terms and conditions are stated clearly whereas the implied contract relates to the conduct of the parties. Thus resonating with the given case study flyer was implied contract as the offeree has responded upon it depending upon the conditions that have been stated (Harper James, 2021). Thus, it can be observed that the consideration given by Mary is of equal value.
Conclusion
In the given case Mary and Hannah have filled out the form on 30th January in order to take the advantage of the special New Year Offer of the Southbank leisure center to become a premier member without giving extra money. This offer was valid until 31st January. The manager of the gym asked them to fill out the form and sign the direct debit form and said that he would fill the remaining portion of the form. After they have signed and filled out the form, the manager asked them to collect the membership card from the desk on Saturday. However, both the women picked up the membership card on 2nd February and forgot the free spots bags. Two weeks later they came to know that £180 got deducted from their bank account instead of £120 which was the actual price for the local residents to claim the offer. However, when they contacted the gym the authorities replied that they have processed their form on 1st February after the offer got expired. Moreover, they were also told that the manager has left the club. Due to this, it has been observed that the gym has committed fraud with them. In this situation, they must file a case in court for the breach of the contract. There are many potential remedies that the court might award in this case based upon the nature of the breach and term stated in the contract as well as if there exist some special circumstances. Firstly the court might order compensatory damages based on the actual loss that Mary and Hannah have sustained for instance as observed in Wassenaar v. Towne Hotel (WI 1983) (Connellan, 2021). Another remedy that can be ordered by the court for the breach of contract is the specific performance of the contractual terms as stated. In the above case, the court might order the gym to work according to the terms and conditions that have been stated in the flyer and provide Mary all the benefits that they were eligible for as observed in Duff and Russell (209) (NY Sup 1891) (Dagan & Heller, 2020). However, in this situation, Mary has another option to refuse to the contract by the remedy of rescission.
References
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