Fisher+v+Bell

=Fisher v Bell [1961] 1 QB 394=

Facts:
The Defendant displayed a flick knife in teh window of his shop next to a tag bearing the words "Ejector knife - 4 shillings". Under the law of the time, it was illegal to manufacturer, sell, hire, or lend to any other person, any knife "which has a blade which opens automatically by hand pressure applied to a button etc". On 14 December 1959, a member of the police force brought forward information against the Defendant alleging they had broken the law.

Held (High Court)
At first instance, the Prosecutor submitted that the Defendant had displayed the knife and tag in the window with the object of attracting a buyer, and that this constituted an offer of sale sufficient to create a criminal liability under the Act. The Defendant submitted that this was not sufficient to constitute an offer. The judges at the first instance found that displaying the knife was merely an __invitation to treat__, not an offer, and thus no liability arose. The Prosecutor appealed the judges' decision.

Held (Court of Appeal)
The court upheld that, although the display of a knife in a window might at first appear to "lay people" to be an offer inviting people to buy it, and that it would be "nonsense to say that [it] was not offering it for sale", whether an item is offered for the purpose of the Act in question must be construed in the context of the general law of the country. He stated that the general law of the country clearly established that merely displaying an item constituted an invitation to treat. He also read the statute on an exclusive construction (inclusio unius exclusio alterius est),noting that other legislation prohibiting the sale of weapons referred to "offering //or exposing for sale//" (emphasis added). The lack of the words //exposing for sale// in the Restriction of Offensive Weapons Act 1959 suggested that only a true offer would be prohibited by the Act. The court dismissed the appeal.