Free ACCA & CIMA online courses from OpenTuition

Free Notes, Lectures, Tests and Forums for ACCA and CIMA exams

March 2026 ACCA Exams Results

Comments & Instant poll

Save 20% on ACCA & CIMA Books

Interactive BPP books for June 2026 exams, recommended by OpenTuition.
Get discount code >>

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Sir,
    I just referred to my study text and they don’t have the ‘Whitely v Chappell’ case or the ‘re Sigsworth’ case as examples for the literal and golden rule. I’m curious if it would disadvantage me if I used the cases you mentioned and not the study text cases for the exam. Thanks.

  2. Hello sir,
    The lectures are brilliant. Makes law more interesting than i ever imagined. Jus wondering if there is further lectures on chap 3 covering statutory interpretAtion presumptions and delegated legislations. Thanks.

    • Hi! No, what you see is what you get! Statutory rules and presumptions in interpretation are not frequently asked in the exams. But, no, there are no plans in the near future to add further lectures in this area. Remember, we have to leave you with something to do for yourselves 馃檪

  5. Due to the materials being updated the page numbers have changed for the cases – therefore I though I might note them as they may help others;

    Whitley v Chappell Page 129
    Gorris v Scott Page 133
    Evams v Cross Page 133

  6. re Sigsworth case,

    Dear sir, u mentioned the above case in Golden Rule, about a son asked for money from father n mother but were rejected. Son killed his parents. I checked up sigsworth case n it stated the only son killed his mother, not parent. Which is correct?

    • The way I tell the stories is in a way that I hope you will remember and not necessarily precisely close to the facts! That’s not what matters in your situation. You need to remember principles – the cases merely illustrate the principles.

      Is a mother not a parent? So what’s your grievance – was it only one parent ( the mother ) and not both as I tell it?

      • if the mother was killed then the house would have gone to the father? so the son wouldn’t have benefited if the father was still alive?

      • Hi essem,
        Good point ! This forced me to research and google this case. I will quote the entire case just to save others time.

        What i learned was that “Son had murdered his mother. The mother had not made a will and under the Administration of Justice Act 1925 her estate would be inherited by her next of kin, i.e. her son. There was no ambiguity in the words of the Act, but the court was not prepared to let the son who had murdered his mother benefit from his crime. It was held that the literal rule should not apply and that the golden rule should be used to prevent the repugnant situation of the son inheriting.”
        There was NO father i suppose(Dead imo) OR the mother raised the damned son herself.

      • So …… is that wildly different from how I tell it?

        You’re getting into way too much detail – but it’s good to see you developing a real interest in the fascinating paper that is F4

  9. Sir, do we have to learn each and every case name to illustrate the different rules involved, as in while answering any question do we need to quote anything from any cases that in past happened and relate to what we are dealing in present?

  10. Hi,

    I am a bit confused, I found in many other information on the internet about the case of whitely v chappel as the main example of the literal rule, and not of the golden rule, given that this the decision was literal and therefore the defendat was not guilty.

    but I have also seen in other information treated as the golden rule. is there any reason it麓s been treated like that?

    • @sherlyta, The golden rule is applied when the application of the literal rule leads to an absurd situation. So, by applying the literal rule to Whitely v Chappell, Chappell would be not guilty. But that’s absurd! Clearly, it cannot be right that you can vote twice. So the golden rule is applied.

      And that is how Whitely v Chappell can be used to illustrate both the literal rule and the golden rule

      • @MikeLittle, But surely you can only apply one or the other – “Unless it leads to an absurdity”. As the defendant was acquitted, the literal rule was applied. Had the Golden rule been applied, he would have been sentenced – If the presiding judge(s) didn’t treat it as Golden rule, how can it be an example of such?

        I merely put that out in the interest of good debate, but like the others before me, I noted quickly it didn’t concur with other sources, and did feel the need to check!

        The lectures are great by the way, they are a great supplement to my chosen study texts, and handy to listen to passively when my attention span is not quite up to sitting down and reading/writing!

        Also, just a small point – Surely it’s the Companies Act 2006, not 2005?

      • @lukedavidizard, I can’t really follow your first paragraph, but what bits I CAN understand suggest that you’re trying to turn the law upside down. IF the literal rule had been applied, he would have been found not guilty, but that would be absurd. So, although the Courts will apply the literal rule, they ignore that rule in situations where the application of it would lead to an absurdity and in those situations they apply the golden rule which allows them to ignore the literal rule.

        If I have said Companies Act 2005, I apologise without reservation. Of course it’s Companies Act 2006

      • @MikeLittle, Thanks.

        The defendant was charged with impersonating a dead man to obtain an additional vote in an election. The relevant legislation made it an offence to impersonate ‘any person entitled to vote’. Since a dead man wasn’t entitled to vote, impersonating him couldn’t be an offence. Thus a villain was acquitted.

        The literal rule WAS applied, and he was found NOT guilty.

        Now the way I understand it is that the literal rule DID lead to an absurdity, but the Golden Rule was not invoked at this time, because it had not been thought of, or developed far enough.

        The first case to use the parallel doctrine was 2 years after Whitely and Chappell, in 1870…?

Leave a Reply