A Level Law: The Law in Action — Revision Notes

Condensed for the final weeks. For the full explanation, use the The Law in Action study guide.

2.1 The market

Contract formation: offer + acceptance + consideration + intention to create legal relations + capacity. Offer ≠ invitation to treat. Silence ≠ acceptance.

Terms: express or implied. Condition (major, breach → treat as discharged + damages) vs warranty (minor, damages only).

Exclusion clauses: must be incorporated (signature/notice/course of dealing); controlled by UCTA 1977 (ss 2, 3, 11) and CRA 2015 (ss 31, 57, 62, 65). Death/personal injury from negligence can never be excluded.

CRA 2015 implied terms — goods: satisfactory quality (s 9), fit for purpose (s 10), matches description (s 11). Remedies: short-term right to reject (s 20), repair/replacement (s 23), price reduction/final right to reject (s 24).

CRA 2015 implied terms — services: reasonable care and skill (s 49), reasonable time (s 52). Remedies: repeat performance (s 55), price reduction (s 56).

Validity: misrepresentation (Misrepresentation Act 1967); mistake. Discharge: performance / agreement / breach / frustration (Law Reform (Frustrated Contracts) Act 1943).

Privity: Contracts (Rights of Third Parties) Act 1999 — a third party can enforce a term if the contract expressly allows it or purports to benefit them.

Negligence (the alternative route): duty of care (foreseeable + proximate + fair/just/reasonable) → breach (reasonable-person standard) → damage caused (factual + legal causation; res ipsa loquitur where the cause is unclear) → damages (must mitigate) or injunction.

Defences: volenti non fit injuria (full defence — free, informed consent to the risk); contributory negligence (Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Act 1945 — reduces damages, doesn’t defeat the claim).

2.2 The criminal offender

Actus reus + mens rea normally both needed; strict liability = no mens rea for at least one element (mostly regulatory offences).

Actus reus: causation (factual — “but for” — and legal — operating and substantial cause); liability for omissions only where a duty exists (contract, relationship, defendant’s own prior dangerous act).

Mens rea: intention (aim/purpose, or a result foreseen as virtually certain) vs subjective recklessness (defendant personally foresaw an unjustified risk and took it). Transferred malice — mens rea for one victim/object transfers to the actual one harmed.

Property offences (know the Act + section):

Offence	Act	Section
Theft	Theft Act 1968	ss 1–6
Robbery	Theft Act 1968	s 8
Burglary	Theft Act 1968	s 9
Blackmail	Theft Act 1968	ss 21, 34
Fraud by false representation	Fraud Act 2006	s 2
Obtaining services dishonestly	Fraud Act 2006	s 11
Making off without payment	Theft Act 1978	s 3
Criminal damage	Criminal Damage Act 1971	s 1 (lawful excuse: s 5)

Defences: duress of threats / duress of circumstances (objectively reasonable, immediate response to threat of death/serious injury); voluntary intoxication (no defence to basic intent, may negate mens rea of specific intent) vs involuntary intoxication (defence if it genuinely prevented forming mens rea).

Sentencing (Criminal Justice Act 2003): custodial sentences, community orders, fines, discharges — reflects seriousness, aggravating/mitigating factors, and the statutory purposes of sentencing.

2.3 The individual

Defamation Act 2013 (ss 1, 2, 3, 4, 15): libel (permanent form) vs slander (transient form). Requires serious harm to reputation (s 1). Defences: truth (s 2), honest opinion (s 3), public interest publication (s 4).

HRA 1998: Article 10 (freedom of expression, qualified by Art 10(2)); Article 11 (freedom of assembly). Route to the European Court of Human Rights once domestic remedies are exhausted — a successful judgment pressures government, doesn’t automatically change UK law.

Privacy: Data Protection Act 2018 (ss 1–7, 43, 45, 170 — s 170 criminalises unlawfully obtaining personal data); Article 8 ECHR (respect for private/family life, home, correspondence). Freedom of Information Act 2000 — the opposite direction: public access to information held by public authorities.

Occupiers’ liability: OLA 1957 = common duty of care to lawful visitors. OLA 1984 = narrower duty regarding known dangers to non-visitors (trespassers) — only where the occupier knows/has reasonable grounds to believe a danger exists and someone may be near it.

Trespass to land: unlawful, intentional, direct interference with possession of land. Can be continuing (fresh cause of action each day). Remedies: damages, injunction.

Exam traps

• Studying negligence as an addition to contract rather than the named alternative for 2.1.
• Mixing up which Theft Act covers which offence (1968 vs 1978).
• Confusing robbery (force to steal) with burglary (trespassory entry with intent).
• Claiming an ECtHR win automatically overturns UK law.
• Applying the 1957 duty to a trespasser, or the 1984 duty to a lawful visitor.

Self-test

1. State the five requirements for a valid contract to form.
2. Name the CRA 2015 sections for satisfactory quality and for fitness for purpose.
3. Give the three elements of a negligence claim and both defences.
4. Which Act and section covers burglary? Which covers making off without payment?
5. What must a claimant now prove under s 1 of the Defamation Act 2013?
6. What is the key difference between the duties under the 1957 and 1984 Occupiers’ Liability Acts?

Answers: 1. Offer, acceptance, consideration, intention to create legal relations, capacity. 2. Satisfactory quality — s 9; fitness for purpose — s 10. 3. Duty of care, breach, damage caused by the breach; defences are volenti non fit injuria and contributory negligence. 4. Burglary — Theft Act 1968, s 9; making off without payment — Theft Act 1978, s 3. 5. Serious harm to their reputation. 6. The 1957 Act imposes a common duty of care on lawful visitors; the 1984 Act imposes a narrower duty on non-visitors (trespassers), engaged only where the occupier knows or has reasonable grounds to believe a danger exists and someone may come near it.