Origins of the Doctrine of Promissory Estoppel - Coursework Example

DOCTRINE OF PROMISORY ESTOPPEL by Student’s name Course + code name Professor’s name University name City, State Date Discussion of “The doctrine of promissory estoppels is necessary to prevent unjust outcomes that may result from strict application of common law. Australian courts, however, have expanded the doctrine to the point where consideration is no longer relevant”. Origins of the Doctrine of Promissory Estoppel The doctrine of promissory estoppel is attributed to Lord Denning’s Central London Property v High Trees1 case the grounds of which in history originate from two pre-existing common law estoppel sources, a strategy for imposing constancy invoked to prevent an individual from returning to their promise the moment it would be deemed inequitable, as well as the waiver’s doctrine equitable, that surfaced in Hughes v Metropolitan Railway,2 and serves as ways of momentarily suspending legal rights. In a word, Estoppel possesses its origins from good consciousness, equity and justice sense. Actually, the moment Denning stated that the intention of the promise was to: bind, intended being acted on, and truly acted upon, turn to be binding so long as its application of terms are in place, was proposing that, all things that were required in order for a promise to be regarded as enforceable turn to be that the intended party that it was made for has truly acted as a result of relying with it. In different words, the doctrine of promissory estoppel adopts a reliance-grounded hypothesis of contracts’ enforceability. Thus, it becomes extraneous whether the person who has been promised has offered whatever thing in swap within benefit terms’ to the person who promised, or damage endured at the request of a promisor. A suggestion exists that promissory estoppel can never exist within vacuum; there ought to be a prevailing legal association between the parties that is being changed by the promissory estoppel. As such, the High Trees3 case clearly illustrates this suggestion. The Application of Doctrine of Promissory Estoppel in Australia in Preventing Unfair Outcomes That May Result from Strict Application of Common Law The doctrine of promissory estoppel in Australia has expanded into a more expensive model in comparison to that of the United States and England. In the first case Waltons Stores (Interstate) Ltd V Maher, the High Court developed the doctrine of estoppel for the purposes of including an implied inaction or promise that encourages the petitioner to act to his/her injury. Like Justice Killam noted in Ewing v Dominion Bank, under certain situations, silence yields estoppel’. At the fall of September of 1983, negotiations between Waltons Stores and the Mahers begun with an aim of Waltons renting the property of Maher at the place referred as Norwa. The Mahers suggested bringing down the existing construction on land and build another one appropriate for purposes of Walton. Waltons sent a draft lease to Maher in the month of October. On the presumption that the deal of leasing would succeed, Maher began bringing down the aged buildings the moment their lawyer informed the solicitor of Walton about the demolishing of the buildings. In the wake of November 1983, Mr Maher stressed that Waltons was mandatorily required to signing the lease ahead of knocking down the other new portion of that building which was made of bricks. The solicitor of Waltons reacted that the lease’s negotiated terms turned to be admissible and Waltons was going to complete the lease the following day. Before November came to an end, Waltons developed second thoughts of regarding going on with the lease. In early December, they received the information that demolition was on going. Nonetheless, Waltons never communicated to Mahers till Maher had commenced building a new house before clarification from Walton that they were no longer interested in proceeding with the agreed lease. As a result, the Mahers began proceedings in New South Wales Supreme Court for damages’ or lease’s specific performance in lieu4. Kearney J provided a ruling for the Mahers the specific performance’s damages experienced. The consequent decision of High Court instituted the Australian law of estoppel principles that turn to be wider and supple in comparison to the doctrine of English within that it never limits the doctrine that is to be applied merely as a guard, but as well as a sword . The crucial points within that case turn to be; number one, the idea of estoppel was expanded by the court for the purposes of including an implicit pledge, being either having knowledge of inaction or promoting acquiescence. Secondly, Brenna J in his analysis of equitable estoppel included six elements, being the assumption of plaintiff that a legitimate relationship would be formed; the inducement of the defendant of the presumption; the applicant’s dependence on the presumption, the knowledge of defendant of the dependence, the applicant’s detrimental inaction or action, and the failure of defendant to avoid that harm. Thirdly, Deane J built up the doctrine of estoppels of Australia through identifying a presumption or representation of a future situation rather than conventional prevailing condition. Lastly, Gardon J pointed out that the claimant possessed a positive right of claiming the estopppel’s benefit which is known as the sword metaphorically, so that estoppel would be regarded as being cause of action. The other example of Australian case is Commonwealth v. Verwayen5. The case’s facts’ turned to be simple. In this case, on February 10 1964 Mr Verwayen got injured the moment HMAS Melbourne and the Voyager crashed when in warfare exercises. Mr Verwayen sued the Commonwealth in 1984 in the Supreme Court of Victoria for negligence damages. The Commonwealth for the purposes of defending itself confessed carelessness, but not the negligence that the petitioner had received injuries or had suffered damage or loss. The Commonwealth never pleaded that the action turned to be debarred by Limitations of Actions Act 1958, or the idea that the Commonwealth6 never owed Mr Verwayen a duty of care since the Voyager got involved within warfare operations during the collision’s moment. Both ahead and after filing the defence, the Commonwealth pointed out that it had espoused a policy of never challenging responsibility and not entreating the limitations’ statute. Following the 1985’s policy changes, the Commonwealth made a leave application for amending its defence for the purposes of raising the two defences, which according to many people - was erroneously admitted. The legitimate questions that surfaced turned to be whether statement of the commonwealth that it was not going to entreat the limitations’ statute turned to be a statutory rights’ waiver that are possible of being repealed or a pledge of not asserting a legitimate right that is impossible to resile. As such, Gaudron JJ and Toohey categorized the commonwealth’s statement as a rights’ waiver. However, Brennan J never agreed and evaluated that case in estoppel’s terms. Dawson J on the other hand, considered it as being non-doggedness on a lawful right. My consideration turn to be that that statement turned to be promissory. The difference between the two turn to be indistinct like how Ethwart admitted that waiver turned to be evidently an empty classification. Nevertheless, it is in general considered that a pledge turns to be specific assurance whereas a waiver turns to be a legal right abandonment. The requirement of promise turns to be involvement of two parties while, a waiver turns to be a one-sided action. For instance, in Jorden v Money6, the promise of Jorden of not using the bond against Money turns to be a pledge and not waiver. But sensibly, the two models share similar effect: the two can be the foundation for estoppel. Many of the High Court judges repudiated the doctrine of waiver application and preferred applying that of the promissory estoppel. Therefore, the Commonwealth’s appeal got dismissed as the promissory estoppel, although the finding of the trial judge of the absence of a pre-prevailing legal relationship never changed the case’s nature. Australian judges normally lay extra emphasis on the actual harm suffered by the promisee within a specific case, instead of the approach employed in Waltons Stores (Interstate) Ltd v Maher that stresses the anticipations made by the pledge. Discussion of How Australian Courts have expanded the Doctrine to the Point where Consideration is No Longer Relevant and The Effects Successive Decisions That They have had On It Despite the fact that the admission towards promissory estoppel initially turned to be, finally, it obtained legality with the identification of the entire High Court of Australia in Legione v Hateley7 152 case. From that perspective, the Australian courts never turned back in identifying that doctrine till in the Walton Store V Maher 164 CLR164, the High Court of Australia made a main breakthrough within this doctrine through resolving that; promissory estoppel itself could be utilised as an action’s cause against a defendant even in instances there was no contractual correlation. Going back to the facts, it turns to be apparent that there existed no contractual correlation between the involved parties and as a matter of fact, there was nothing like contractual relationship that ever prevailed. It was impossible to conclude the contract as there was no execution of the leases’ exchange by the appellants. Nonetheless, the granting of promissory estoppel turned to be grounded on the depiction by the appellants at the moment of discussions on the building of the store by middle of January the year 1984. The other Australia’s kind of departure can be manifested in the judgement of Deane J. in the Commonwealth of Australia v Verwayen 170CLR 394 who pointed out that the primary function of the entire estoppel turn to be affording protection against harm that would pursue alteration of a party’s rank if the presumption which contributed to it were abandoned. However, before that development, the preamble of Section 52 of Trade Practices Act 1974 has in fact proved to be ahead of its time to the promissory estoppel’s conventional parameters. In this scenario, Section 52 points out that no corporation in commerce or trade would engage itself in conduct which is deceptive or misleading or is potential of deceiving or misleading8. As such, the expression -engage in conduct –turns to be described by the Acts of Trade Practices as; to take in performing or rebuffing to perform whichever act, counting the manufacturing of, or offering result to a stipulation of, an engagement or contract. Even 5 years prior to the case of Walton store, the Australia High Court within Commercial Bank Limited v Amadio9, had previously made a ruling on the mortgage that was offered by the defendants on their assets to assure the reimbursement of the loan of the business that was made to the company of their sons, that it was reserved on unconscionable grounds. That case turned to be regarded as the point of turning in regurgitating the Australian laws concerning unconscionable undertakings which is recently argued as being one of the promissory estoppel’s basic compositions in case of reliance’s detrimental. On the other hand, promissory estoppel turns to be only utilised as defence. As a matter of fact, this turns to be the slightest ambitious allegation which can be constructed. As such, new legal principles frequently manufacture their initial appearance in non-threatening and truncated appearance. Thus, it ought not cause any surprise in seminal cases of, like, Huges v Metropolitan Ry; estoppel got relied on as the defence. The other point for the doctrine being regarded as irrelevant turn to be that it is possible for a party looking to impose an allegation to verify one component of identifiable cause of action. As such, this seems to be the upshot the promissory estoppel is believed to possess in Robert V Ministry of Pensions.10 In this case, the claimant was alleviated off the saddle of having to verify that, the injury he possessed emanated from war service for the purposes of qualifying for disablement pension as the ministry got stopped from rebuffing that causal correlation. The cause of action of the claimant turned to be apparently identifiable; in this scenario, sui generis or statutory. And still, it was impossible to point out that the colonel was relieved by the estoppel the task to verify the entire components of his cause of action, for instance, that the colonel had worked for a long time and therefore, necessary and eligible for pension, and that he had a very serious injury to be compensated among others. Thus, the estoppel only correlated to the causation question; was the harm relatable to the service of military. That utilisation might have been the cause of stir in Denning LJ in Combe v Combe11 comments on some decisions comprising the case of Robertson and pointed out that there was no case that the defendant litigated on the assertion, assurance or promise per se; he was litigated for another cause, like, pension and the assertion, assurance or promise merely functioned as an auxiliary role - an imperative, for sure, but still an auxiliary role. The other point is that a party can use estoppel looking for imposing claim to verify the entire elements of identifiable cause of action. This seems to be the manner the promissory estoppel was utilised in The Henrik Sif. In this case, the first defendants behaved like they were bill of lading’s party that they were never. This contributed the plaintiff allowing the period of limitation to expire against the 2nd defendant, who in fact was the party to the bill of lading. The judge grounded his judgment for the petitioner within his act against the 1st defendants, on promissory estoppel grounds. It seems that the entire components (consideration, and agreement among others) of an identifiable cause of action got verified by the estoppel. The other point why the doctrine of consideration is irrelevant in Australian Courts is in the case of Chadwick v Manning. It is believed that Board’s judgement did not in whichever manner correlated to the estoppel promissory’s doctrine. However, it turns to be factual that, the Equity’s Chief Judge Owen J, in New South Wales offered the ruling on the equitable estoppel by embodiment grounds, but that issue was never raised in front of the Board, making the counsel to argue that case on the contract law principles’. Actually, one of the primary elements of promissory’s concept turns to be that; it is mandatory to have intention for the purpose of creating legal correlations by a naked promise, lacking that intention instantly prohibits the doctrine’s applicability in this case. Actually, one would think that if the Board resolved that promissory demonstrations of intention of the future were to possess no equitable or legal force, it would have concentrated much on Hughes and the unbiased principles so nearly attached to it. Bibliography Bagley, Constance, Managers and the Legal Environment: Strategies for the 21st Century, (Cengage Learning, 2015). Collins, Hugh, The Law of Contract (Cambridge, 2003). Gillies, Peter (Federation Press, 12th ed, 2004). Koffman, Lawrence and Macdonald Elizabeth, The Law of Contract, (Oxford University Press, 7th ed, 2010). McKendrick, Ewan, Contract Law: Text, Cases and Materials, (2010, 6th ed., Oxford University Press) Punch, Peter, ‘Promissory Estoppel in New South Wales’ (2002)1 U.N.S.W. Law Journal.1. 355, 362 Stone, Richard 2005, The Modern Law of Contract, (Psychology Press, 2005). Taalat, Wan, ‘The Threats to the Limitations Outlining the Present Parameters of Promissory Estoppel’ (2012) 3 A Comparative Study, International Journal of Business and Social Science, 155, 157 The South Australian Sate Reports (University of California, 2011). Read More