Bloomsbury Spencer Bower: Reliance Based Estoppel: The Law of Reliance Based Estoppel and Related Doctrines

Spencer Bower: Reliance-Based Estoppel, previously titled Estoppel by Representation, is the highly regarded and long established textbook on the doctrines of reliance-based estoppel, by which a party is prevented from changing his position if he has induced another to rely on it such that the other will suffer by that change. Since the fourth edition in 2003 the House of Lords has decided two proprietary estoppel cases, Cobbe v Yeoman's Row Property Management Ltd and Thorner v Major, whose combined effect is identified as helping to define a criterion for a reliance-based estoppel founded on a representation, namely that the party estopped actually intends the estoppel raiser to act in reliance on the representation, or is reasonably understood to intend him so to act. Other developments in the doctrine of proprietary estoppel have required a complete revision of the related chapter, Chapter 12, in this edition. Thorner v Major confirms too the submission in the fourth edition that unequivocality is a requirement for any reliance-based estoppel founded on a representation. Other views expressed in the fourth edition are also noted to have been upheld, such as the recognition that an estoppel may be founded on a representation of law (Briggs v Gleeds), that a party may preclude itself from denying a proposition by contract as well as another's reliance (Peekay Intermark Ltd v Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Ltd and Springwell Navigation Corp v JP Morgan Chase Bank) and that an estoppel by deed binds by agreement or declaration under seal rather than by reason of reliance (Prime Sight Ltd v Lavarello). CONTENTS: Part I General Principles Chapter 1 Introduction: definition and treatment Chapter 2 Representations of fact; promises; representations of law; representations as to rights Chapter 3 Responsibility Chapter 4 Unequivocality and construction Chapter 5 Inducement and reliance; the effect of estoppel as to a fact Chapter 6 Parties to the estoppel Chapter 7 The defence of illegality Chapter 8 Estoppel by convention; estoppel by contract; estoppel by deed; estoppel as to title Part II Particular Applications of Reliance-Based Estoppel Chapter 9 Applications of reliance-based estoppel to various relationships Chapter 10 Miscellaneous estoppels Chapter 11 Statutory estoppel Part III Proprietary Estoppel, Election, Promissory Estoppel and Procedure Chapter 12 Proprietary estoppel Chapter 13 Election Chapter 14 Promissory estoppel Chapter 15 Stating the case