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Statutory Interpretation And The Law Of The Country

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Question 1
Introduction
A statute is the formal and the written law of the country. It is passed by the legislative authority of the country. Generally, statutes, and, prohibit or declare something and sometimes, they are also called as legislation. In this way, statutory interpretation means the interpretation of the statutes by the courts. This interpretation takes place when an Act of the Parliament is not clear and as a result, it creates uncertainty in the law. Therefore, statutory interpretation is required when an Act passed by the Parliament is not clear, for example a term could have been used to covers a number of opportunities. Similarly the meaning of a term can also change its meaning over the period of time which results in …show more content…

In this case, the defendant was a shopkeeper and had placed a flick knife along with its price in the window of his shop although no flick knife was sold by the shopkeeper. In this regard, the defendant was charged under section 1(1) of the Registration of Offenses Weapons Act, 1959 according to which any person who sells, hires or offers for sale any flick knife will be guilty of the offense. However in this case, the court was required to decide if defendant had committed the offense of offering the knife for sale. Offer has been given a technical legal meaning by the law of contract. In this regard, the contract law provides that is playing an article in shop window cannot be considered as an offered by it is only an invitation to treat (French, 2011). In this way, by adopting the literal approach of statutory interpretation, the court decided that the shopkeeper was not guilty of offering the flick knife for sale.

Application
In order to decide if the offense prescribed by the Registration of Offenses Weapons Act, 1959 has been committed in these three scenarios or not, the literal, golden or the mischief rule of statutory interpretation has to be applied (Australian Law Students Association, 2009).

Scenario 1
In this case, Jane had confiscated a flick-knife from a member of the youth club and had given the same to her supervisor. In this regard, by applying the mischief rule of statutory interpretation,

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