Australian Contract Code

• NCJ Number: 139728
• Author(s): M P Ellinghaus; E W Wright
• Editor(s): B Moore
• Date Published: 1992
• Length: 91 pages
• Corporate Author: Victorian Law Reform Cmssn
• Publication Format: Document
• Publication Type: Legislation/Policy Analysis
• Language: English
• Country: Australia
• Note: Discussion Paper No. 27

Annotation

This discussion paper presents the draft of an Australian contract code that is intended to be a comprehensive statement of contract law. The paper addresses all possible contract problems and can be easily read and understood by people who are not lawyers.

Abstract

It reviews the reasons for codifying contract law in Australia; general issues about codification; the three basic characteristics of its design; the content of each code; and examples of the code's application, based on the facts of High Court cases. The code's three basic characteristics are its high level of generality, the central role of the concept of unconscionability; and the lack of definitions. Thus, the code contains only 27 articles; asserts that contract rights and obligations may not be asserted unconscionably; and, with the exception of the word "person," uses only words with familiar meanings in common usage.