INTRODUCTION TO LAW AND REGULATORY FRAMEWORK.

FORMATION OF CONTRACT

THE FOLLOWING NOTES SHOULD BE READ IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE CORE LECTURE.

OFFER. A communication is treated as an offer if it indicates the terms on which the offeror is prepared to make a contract and gives a clear indication that the offeror intends to be bound by those terms if they are accepted by the offeree.

Partridge v Crittenden (1968)

An advertisement in a magazine stated ‘Bramblefinch cocks and hens, 25s each’. As the Bramblefinch was a protected species, the person who placed the advertisement was charged with unlawfully offering for sale a wild bird contrary to the Protection of Birds Act 1954, but his conviction was quashed on the grounds that the advertisement was not an offer but an invitation to treat.

Spencer v Harding (1870) LR 5 CP 561
The defendant had sent out a circular stating 'We are instructed to offer [certain business stock] to the wholesale trade for sale by tender ...'. The claimant had submitted a tender for the stock and his tender was the highest, however, the defendant refused to sell him the goods.
The claimant argued that the circular was an offer which contained a promise to sell the goods to the party who submitted the highest tender, but the court rejected this argument.
Willes J. in that case identified the crucial question to be 'whether there is here any offer to enter into a contract at all, or whether the circular amounts to anything more than a mere proclamation that the defendants are ready to chaffer for the sale of goods, and to receive offers for the purchase of them.‘

Redgrave v Hurd (1881)
A solicitor wanted to sell his law practice. He told the buyer that it was worth £300 a year and invited him to check this by inspecting the papers in his office. Had the buyer done this, he could have learned that the practice was