DISCUSSION TOPIC 3:
LORD DENNING
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When reading about the Common Law and Judge Made Law, you will often see references to Lord Denning. Who was Lord Denning and why was he such an important and controversial figurein British Law?
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Lord Denning was a jurist, a barrister and judge. He instigated many important concepts that would become pillars of the common law. One of these is, for example, the "fundamental breach" teory: a so fundamental breach of acontract that it permits the distressed party to terminate performance of it, in addition to entitling that party to sue for damages. He reviewd also the doctrine of "equitable estoppel" (or 'promissory estoppel') that has many individual rules but that generally means that any person arguing a legal position to the court should not have behaved unfairly in the matter. In general estoppel protects a party who would suffer detriment if each following test is met:
- a second party has done or said something to induce an expectation
- the first party relied (reasonably) on the expectation
- the first party would suffer detriment if that expectation were not met.