Contract - Seminar 4 Gibson v Manchester City Council Summarise the facts " Mr Gibson was a tenant of a house owned by Manchester City Council - 14 years " Council introduced new policy allowing tenants to buy their homes " Gibson began negotiations to buy his home " Council wrote to him saying they'd sell the house for £2,725 he was told to complete an application form If he was interested " Once the election took place, Labour replaced conservatives and repealed the policy " Council argued he wasn't able to get the house now - denied his acceptance of the contract · Town Clerk wrote saying the offer wouldn't get through Judgement/Decisions First Court: Sided with Gibson Court of Appeals: Sided with Gibson - concluded there was a concluded agreement for the sale of the house due to correspondence House of Lords held there was no contract between Gibson and Council Dissenting Judgements Court of Appeal: Lane - disagreed said there wasn't a contract - said upon true construction of documents relied by Mr Gibson it was quite obvious there was no terms Mr Gibson could agree too - negotiations leading up to something which didn't materialise Factors used to reach decision & Legal Principles Offers to see Gibson had agreed, he'd started work on the house, obvious he'd wanted to buy the house - made repairs in anticipation for the house becoming his Clear conservatives had wanted to sell the house due to the scheme they implemented it Looked at language - 'may be' prepared to sell - never officially said there was going to be an offer made There was no offer and there was no acceptance Courts Approach Objective approach - looked at what had been said Political Social and Economic Aspects Political aspects because there was a change in council which led to a change in policy Should you be able to sue a public body - flood gates Would I have reached a different decision Wouldn't have reached a different decision because there was no offer of acceptance there were only ever negotiations, there was working of 'may be willing to sell' didn't specifically say they were going to sell
Storer v Manchester City Council Summarise the facts " Council send letter offering to sell house Another letter saying if you agree sign letter and send it back After this there had been negotiations between Storer and MCC Labour came into the power and decided they would no longer sell the House · Storer appealed Judgement/Decisions Contract complete Was sufficient to amount an offer which was accepted by Storer and therefore form a contract Only thing left blank was when rent payments would stop and the mortgage payments would start - clause 7, found even though this was left blank it wasn't sufficient enough to mean there wasn't a contract Date of clause 7 was left blank for administrative purposes - not material to contract as could have been decided later after contract