New Discussion Paper published on third party rights in contract law

The Scottish Law Commission published yesterday a Discussion Paper on third party rights in contract law (the DP may be downloaded here). This is an important area of contract law, and reform has been long overdue; ever since the English Law relating to third party rights underwent a sea change in the Contracts (Rights of Third Parties Act 1999), the Scots law in this field has looked distinctly outdated and, more importantly, uncertain. The Scottish Law Commission is considering encapsulating the law of third party rights in a modern, comprehensive Act (an alternative would be simply to tidy up uncertain areas of the law). This observer would strongly favour the comprehensive, statutory option, as part of a more general move towards codification of the law of obligations. Such a codification would set out the law in a clear, easily accessible fashion, thereby making the law of obligations easily accessible to the general public and resolving the problems caused by the many muddled and unclear parts of our law.

Comments are invited by the Scottish Law Commission on the DP by 20th June 2014.