Memorandum for contract law

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To:  Supervising Partner

From:  Stacey Bramall

Re:  Rebecca Evans

Date:  19 December 2008

In writing this memorandum bearing in mind that you are a man of great intelligence I shall attempt to refresh your memory on the area of law in regards to this contract. As you have rightly identified the main area of law in Rebecca’s case is that of frustration and breach of the contract. The first part of the memorandum is going to deal with the aspect of whether the contract was frustrated and then the second part will deal with whether there was breach of the contract.

To establish whether the contract between Rebecca and the Committee leasing out the village hall we need to identify how the contract started and whether a contract actually existed between the two parties. As with all contract law cases there is need to identify that all components are available for a contract to be formed. It is quite clear from the case that Rebecca and the Committee had entered a legally binding contract, since Rebecca is a professional it shows the seriousness of her intention. The discussion between the parties was based on a commercial agreement. The advertisement for the village hall was an invitation to treat Fisher v Bell which was waiting to be accepted by Rebecca. The contract was formed through the acceptance of the invitation to treat as laid out in Patridge v. Crittenden, this therefore resulted in Rebecca getting the 1year lease. Since the contract is in place focus is now going to be placed on whether the contract was frustrated. To refresh your memory, the doctrine of frustration holds out that the contract is discharged following unforeseen events after the contract has been entered into without fault of either party. Frustration discharges the parties from further contractual performance since the whole contract is rendered illegal, further performance of any contractual obligations is made impossible and radical changes in the circumstances means that the obligations are made different to what the parties agreed to on formation.

It was previously thought that the doctrine of frustration could not apply to leases but the case of National Carriers v. Panalpina (Northern) Ltd changed this. The House of Lords accepted that leases can be frustrated; it was held that as a matter of principle leases could be frustrated but they admitted that as a matter of practice the courts would be reluctant to conclude that a lease has been frustrated. In the Panalpina case the lease was for 99years but this decision also applies to short term contracts thus this paves way for Rebecca to frustrate the contract.

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In this case there was a fire in the hall which mainly affected the office and there was smoke damage to the main hall. One of the main cases under the doctrine of frustration is that of Taylor v. Caldwell  where there was the hire of a musical for a concert and the concert hall was destroyed by fire 6days prior to the contract starting. The courts held that it was an implied term within the contract that the hall should exist for the contract to go ahead. The same can be applied to Rebecca’s case, since the main ...

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