Rules of Statutory Interpretation - Reckitt Benckiser Pty Ltd - Case Study Example

Name: Tutor: Subject: Date: Rules of Statutory Interpretation The Statutory interpretation can be explained as the interpretation and application of legislation by courts. When a statute is involved in a case, then there is a need for some interpretation. This is because the statute could either have direct meaning or could be ambiguous. In a case of ambiguity of the statute's wording, a judge is involved in order to resolve. Judges have several tools that they apply in order to find the meaning of the various statutes applied. These tools include the legislative purpose and history, statutory interpretation of the traditional canon. This interpretation is help in case there is arising of complexity on a certain section of the statutes. To highlight a few of the instances where statutory interpretation is required are; where drafting error occurred, the legislation omitted some specific points, the term used is broad, also vagueness where the term used in the statute has more than one meaning thus resulting in different interpretations of the word in the statute. A number of rules that apply to the statutory interpretation. The literal rule is one of the rules that apply statutory interpretation when applying the literal rule; the natural meaning of the words in the statute is used. This implies that the words in the statute have a literal meaning and have no other meaning. Therefore, the literal rule cannot be further analyzed for more meaning. This rule is mostly applied by the judges who feel that they should firmly apply the laws directly as enacted by the parliament. The Golden rule is applicable where the plain meaning rule bears outcome where there is avoidance of applying the parliament's intention. It helps in the prevention of absurdity while one interprets the law literally. The mischief rule; the judges, are involved in the determination of the intentions of the legislator. This rule sets out a question; what are the "defects and the agitations" that the act intends to correct? It also set out a ruling that would be effective in the implementation the remedy. Unlike literal rule the purposive rule is flexible; the literal rule is known to take a literal meaning of each word while the purposive rule is much broader such that it does not take into consideration of the literal meaning of individual words. Australian law prohibits corporations from misleading the consumers. This doctrine adopted by the Australian law is meant to protect the consumers of various commodities from oppression and misleading on the quality and components of the products. The law restricts any person engaged in trade from misleading the customers. This section of the law also prohibits some conducts that are likely to deceive the consumers. The doctrine does not clearly state the social class of individuals that should be put into consideration while determining whether the conduct in question is misleading. In this case, the courts consider what the individuals know and also what they ought to have known about one another. Therefore, the supportive approach cannot be important while the term deceptive conduct is interpreted. The doctrine should, therefore, state the class of individuals, it should also be in a position to isolate an individual in that specific social class and be in a position to apply to test to the isolated individual. The other limitation is that there are certain individuals who make assumptions which are more extreme and are not protected. Others do not take reasonable care and thus not entitled to protection. In that connection, therefore, the court has to consider the context itself whether it was misleading or not. The best rule of statutory interpretation, therefore, according to the courts is the purposive approach since it is broader. Judges can be in a position to develop laws that are in line with the intentions of the parliament since it is flexible. The courts also find the golden rule important since some products could use terms that are vague. This will enable the court to interpret the terms as used in the context. In the interpretation of the terms that the corporations will use enables to protect the consumers from being oppressed. In the case of Reckitt Benckiser (Australia) Pty Ltd The court found that the company misleads the consumers in that the Nurofen specific pain products were formulated in a way that they were to treat specific types of pain while all the products were all identical. This specific pain product consisted of the following products: Nurofen Period Pain, Nurofen Back Pain, Nurofen Tension Headache and Nurofen Migraine Pain. The court, therefore, found that all the four products were identical in that they all had the same components (ingredients, i.e., ibuprofen lysine 342mg,). This was misleading since the since they would all serve the same purpose without any of them being more effective than the other. Reckitt Benckiser misleads consumers through the packages of the products and the website that each of the products was to treat a specific type of pain and was also formulated such that it would treat a specific type of pain. The Australian competition and consumer commission (ACCC) also instituted proceedings against Reckitt Benckiser (RB) with the allegation that they mislead their customers. The Australian competition and consumer commission also found that the prices of these products were almost twice the price of their competitors (Latimer, and Paul, 52). The consumers purchased more of the Reckitt Benckiser's products than other painkillers with the belief that they were better compared to the rest (Kaye and Bruce, 860). ACCC had to take the proceedings since it was much concerned with the health conditions of the consumers. If the consumers are misled by the manufacturers by providing them with the wrong information, then they are likely to make the wrong purchasing decisions. The court ordered that RB should not distribute or sell any product under their package. The court also ordered RB to have an implementation of a compliance program for the consumer protection (Bellamy, Sheila, Morley, Watty 28). It was also ordered to pay a cost of the ACCC. The Reckitt Benckiser and the Australian competition and consumer commission also agreed to the arrangement of the packaging. The pills have also been described as for the general pain in the company's Australian website. It is indicated that it all the pills have the same ingredient and therefore, they relief temporally pains and not specific types of pains as indicated on the packages. However, RB consented to the court orders and within three months all the products were removed from the display and also from the sales. Reckitt Benckiser also on the newspaper and on its website gave a notice of the corrective action it undertook. The court found that the information on the website and the packages were misleading. The court, therefore, ordered the removal of these products from the shelves since they treated a general pain and not a specific type of pain as the manufacturer had misled consumers. The Australian competition and consumer commission won against Reckitt Benckiser would serve a better position of safeguarding the health conditions of the consumers. The double pricing of the product was only meant to raise the profit margin of the company since many consumers would go for their drugs which are pain specific than the general painkillers. The product having the same active ingredient but packed in packets with different labels was misleading the consumers. This gave RB better chance to mislead more customers in Australia, yet they were identical products. According to my view, I agree with the interpretation as given by the court to the term misleading. The reasoning by the manufacturer to brand the identical product under several names would mislead the individual customers and thus was a deceptive conduct. RB had set the prices of its product almost twice that of the competitors, yet it would serve the same purpose. This is a clear indication that their main aim was to expand their profit margins without considering the health conditions of the consumers. RB consented with the orders made by the court. The Reckitt Benckiser agreed that they were involved in the deceptive conduct. Therefore they were misleading the consumers, and that is the reason they had to cooperate with the Australian competition and consumer commission (Ramsay, and Ian 40). The Reckitt Benckiser agreed to remove their products from the shelves and notify the consumers through their website and on the newspaper of their corrective action, indicating that they had earlier misled the buyers. The pills contained the same active ingredients. However, on their adverts, they indicated that the products were designed to treat different types of pains and that each brand had a specific treatment. RB also claimed that the Australian register had approved their products which were not the case as the products could not treat their respective types of pains. Work cited Bellamy, Sheila, Clive Morley, and Kim Watty. "Why business academics remain in Australian universities despite deteriorating working conditions and reduced job satisfaction: An intellectual puzzle." Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management 25.1 (2003): 13-28. Kaye, Bruce N. "Codes of ethics in Australian business corporations." Journal of Business Ethics 11.11 (1992): 857-862. Latimer, Paul. Australian Business Law 2012. CCH Australia Limited, 2012. Ramsay, Ian. "Enforcement of corporate rights and duties by shareholders and the Australian Securities Commission: Evidence and analysis." Australian Business Law Review 23.3 (1995). Read More