Remedies
The defendant agreed to pay Cutter 30 guineas for acting as second mate aboard a vessel plying between Jamaica and Liverpool.
Cutter died when the vessel was nineteen days short of Liverpool.
His widow could recover nothing in respect of the work he had performed during the previous 49 days of the voyage.
Where a person agrees to do something for a lump sum, he can normally only sue for payment if the work is substantially performed; the courts will not imply a contract in favour of a plaintiff who has made an express agreement and failed to perform it (rule).
No one should be entitled to claim payment unless he has done what he has bargained to do.
Compare HOENIG v ISAACS (1952) (CA)
F. E. Rose (London) Ltd. v. William H. Pim Jnr. & Co. Ltd. 1953
The plaintiffs received from the Middle East an order for 'Moroccan horsebeans' described as 'feveroles'. Negotiating, the defendants, being asked what those beans were, said they were just 'horsebeans'.
Later, the plaintiffs discovered that they were in fact different from what they wanted.
So they sought to have the contract rectified so as to read 'feveroles' for 'horsebeans'.
This failed.
Verbal agreement and document were in accord (though the plaintiff had wanted 'feveroles', they agreed on 'horsebeans' after they asked the defendants).
The mistake was unilateral.
H. Parsons (Livestock) Ltd. v. Uttley Ingham & Co. Ltd. 1978 Court of Appeal
By the defendants' default, the plaintiffs' pigs ate mouldy nuts from which they contracted an unforeseeable disease of which they died.
The defendants were liable for the loss.
In contract, as in tort, if the loss is of a 'type' which ought to have been contemplated it will not be held to be too remote even though the actual form it takes could not have been.
It was a 'serious possibility' that such a diet would make the animals ill.
Death of livestock comes under the same 'type' as illness.
That may be good law, but the CA's further pronouncement that the rules of remoteness themselves are the same in contract and tort flies in the face of the HERON II (a HL decision) and cannot be accepted.
The CA ruled that the test of remoteness is whether the relevant loss ought to have been contemplated as a 'serious possibility'.
A crank shaft broke in the plaintiff's mill, which meant that the mill had to stop working. The plaintiffs wanted to send the shaft to the manufacturer as quickly as possible, so that it could be used as a pattern for a new one. Speed was essential since, while the mill was stopped, the plaintiffs lost profits.
The carriers commissioned by the plaintiff were guilty of serious delay in making delivery. On the above facts, the plaintiffs brought an action for breach of contract by reason of the delay.
This loss of profits was not a "natural" consequence of delay in delivering a crank shaft, the claim therefore failed.
The plaintiffs had done nothing to bring the case within the operation of Rule II.
There was nothing in the information the defendants had that delay in delivery would cause a loss of profits.
Illustrates the operation of Rule I.
Miss W undertook to sing at a series of concerts organized by L.
She also undertook not to sing elsewhere during the period of which the concerts were to last.
An injunction could be granted to restrain her from singing elsewhere.
In the case of contracts for personal services injunctions will not be used so as to tie someone to someone else or "starve".
This point is now confirmed by the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992.
Here, the effects of granting the injunction was not necessarily to force Miss W to perform the positive covenant to sing for L.
It merely encouraged her to do so, by preventing her from singing elsewhere. If the effect of it would have been to force
LUMLEY v. GYE (1853) (Tort Law)
The plaintiff agreed, for L100, to write a book for the defendants, who were publishers.
When he had written part of the book the defendants abandoned the project and repudiated the contract.
The plaintiff could recover L50, upon a quantum meruit.
Though he had never completed the contract, yet, he ought not to lose the fruits of his labour upon the defendants'
Where, under the terms of a contract, one person performs services for another, and the other breaks or repudiates the contract, the person who has performed the services may usually, instead of claiming damages, sue upon a quantum meruit to recover the amount earned by his labours.
Quinn v. Burch Bros. (Builders) Ltd. 1966
The plaintiff was engaged upon some building work as subcontractor for the defendants who were obliged, when necessary, to supply him with a ladder on request.
This they failed to do, so the plaintiff used an unfitted trestle which was clearly dangerous in the circumstances.
He fell and was injured.
Although it was true that they had broken their contract, the defendants were not liable.
The plaintiff had brought the injury upon himself.
In contract, as in tort, there must be a causal connection between the defendant's default and the plaintiff's loss.
The former cannot by any test be held responsible for something which he did not cause.
Compare: MCWILLIAMS v. SIR WILLIAM ARROL & CO. LTD. (1962) in tort.
The Heron II, Koufos v. C. Czarnikow Ltd. 1969 House of Lords
The defendants were late in delivering goods to a commercial port.
This affected the re-sale value of those goods.
The owners of the goods could recover their loss of profit from the defendant shipowners.
The delay was something which would have the probable effet of depreciating the re-sale value of the goods by reason of a drop in the their market price during the period of delay.
The HL reconsidered the relationship of the rules as to remoteness of damage in contract and tort. The degree of foresight required under Rule I in
Victoria Laundry (Windsor) Ltd. v. Newman Industries Ltd. 1949
The plaintiffs were launderers and dyers who ordered a particularly large boiler, both in order to extend their existing business and to provide them with a suitable plant for obtaining certain exceptionally profitable dyeing contracts. Through the fault of the defendants' sub-contractors, the delivery of this boiler was seriously delayed. The plaintiffs claimed as damages:
(1) The loss of the increased profits which the use of the boiler would have acquired for them during the period of the delay.
(2) The amount which they would have earned from the dyeing contracts during the same period.
Damages were recoverable under the first head.
With regard to the second head, the plaintiffs could not recover upon the basis of the exceptionally high figure contemplated in their contracts.
The defendants knew, at the time of the agreement, that the plaintiffs were dyers and launderers and they were informed that the boiler was required for immediate use.
The second head was something which the defendants could not reasonably have contemplated in the light of the facts known to them at the time of the agreement, and the plaintiffs had not informed them of the contracts.
This case provides a contrast with