Discharge
Blackburn Bobbin Co. v. Allen 1918
The seller agreed to supply the buyer with Finnish timber.
Unknown to the buyer, the seller held no stocks but customarily shipped orders directly from Finland.
War broke out and the seller's supplies were cut off.
This event did not frustrate the contract.
The method of supply was irrelevant to it.
All that the buyer knew, the seller held stocks of Finnish timber, or obtained it indirectly from some other country.
The element in the contract which the supervening event destroys must be something which both the parties must have regarded as basic.
Herne Bay Steam Boat Co. v. Hutton 1903
Contract for the hire of a ship to see the Spithead review of the fleet by the King AND to cruise round the assembled fleet.
The contract was not frustrated.
The event relied upon must destroy the very root of the contract. Compare: Krell v. Henry.
Hoenig v. Isaacs 1952 Court of Appeal
The plaintiff agreed to furnish and decorate the defendant's falt for L750.
The contract has been substantially completed.
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.
Jackson v. Union Marine Insurance Co. Ltd. 1874
A ship was stranded on a reef and was put out of action for a length of time which rendered its voyage commercially impracticable.
Here, the doctrine of frustration received considerable extension.
Contract for the hire of a room to see King Edward VII's coronation procession.
It has been frustrated when the procession was cancelled due to the King's illness.
The event relied upon must destroy the very root of the contract. Compare:
Herne Bay Steamboat.Ocean Tramp Tankers Corpn. v. V/O Sovfracht The Eugenia 1964
The Eugenia's charterers allowed her to enter the Canal Zone in face of the obvious danger of closure.
The detention was not treated as frustration.
They brought it about themselves.
The plaintiff sued the defendant for rent.
The defendant should have made express provision against such a contingency.
Originally, the law was strict: it took the view that the contract would remain in force.
A owed B L100.
It was there laid down that payment of a lesser sum than the amount due, cannot normally be treated as a satisfaction for an existing debt.
Exceptions:
A agreed to hire out a music hall to B. Six days before the letting the hall was accidentally destroyed by fire.
The contract was therefore discharged when the hall was destroyed.
The continued existence of the hall was a basic assumption upon which the contract was founded.
Tsakiroglou & Co. Ltd. v. Noblee and Thorl GmbH 1962 House of Lords
A contract for the sale of groundnuts which was elastic in its terms as to the date of delivery in Hamburg (the port of destination).
The contract has not been frustrated by the closure of the Suez Canal in 1956.
A person who seeks to avoid a contract on the ground of frustration must show not merely that the event has rendered the contract more onerous than he had expected, but also that it has destroyed the whole foundation of it.
W. J. Tatem Ltd. v. Gamboa 1939
A ship was let on charter to the Republican Government to evacuate refugees during the Spanish Civil War.
Despite he obviousness of the risk, capture was held to frustrate the contract.
The supervening event must not normally be one which the parties expressly allowed for in the contract.