BCLI Asks for Public Comment on Proposed Changes to the Law of Contracts
March 7, 2011
BY Alison Taylor
With today’s publication of the Consultation Paper on Proposals for Unfair Contracts Relief, the British Columbia Law Institute is asking the public to comment on its proposals for reform of the law of contracts.
“Contract law has traditionally developed case by case in the courts,” noted Prof. Joost Blom, Q.C., chair of the BCLI’s Unfair Contracts Relief Project Committee. “This consultation paper gives the public the opportunity to participate in policy development on some important longstanding issues in the law of contracts.”
The consultation paper contains 46 proposals designed to modernize and clarify how the law of contracts deals with unfairness. Its leading proposal is for British Columbia to enact a Contract Fairness Act. This act would consolidate the major concepts that have evolved in contract law to guard against unfairness.
The consultation paper proposes clarifying the tests for unconscionability, duress, and undue influence and integrating how those concepts operate at the level of procedure and remedy. It proposes establishing an implied duty of good faith in the performance of contracts. And it proposes reforms aimed at modernizing the scope of and remedies available for misrepresentation.
Copies of the consultation paper, a backgrounder (containing a list of the paper’s proposals), and a form for sending in a response are all available for downloading at no charge on the BCLI’s website at www.bcli.org/projects/unfair-contracts-relief.
The British Columbia Law Institute strives to be a leader in law reform by carrying out the best in scholarly law-reform research and writing and the best in outreach relating to law reform.
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Contact: Kevin Zakreski
Staff Lawyer
(604) 827-5336
