LAW1023 The Law of Contract Assignment Brief 2026 | DCU

LAW1023 Assignment Brief

Instructions (please read in full)

Your answer to the below question will comprise your 100% evaluation in respect of this module. You will not be required to sit the in-person, invigilated end-of-term examination which all other students on this module will be obliged to take.

You are invited to use up to a maximum of 4,000 words to answer the question posed, inclusive of any citations or other footnotes.  You must write this essay in appropriate, professional English without errors.

I am mindful that English is not your mother tongue. I do not intend to use this assignment as an English language skill assessment. However, your ability to write legal analysis in English is a skill which is relevant for me to assess. If you find yourself in difficulty with this DCU has resources available for to assist you in the task of writing assignments.

You should reference cases cited using the OSCOLA Ireland referencing system. Information on this style may be found at www.legalcitation.ie. I will also provide you the citation guide to this format as part of the document bundle for this assignment. A failure to adequately cite sources is a type of plagiarism and may constitute academic misconduct.

You must write this assignment yourself, independently. This means you may not discuss the content of this assignment with any other person. This is especially true for the students who have been given this assignment – you are absolutely forbidden from collaborating or working with each other to improve your own answers. You must complete this assignment alone.

You must use your own words to complete this assignment. Copying and pasting text from other sources without citation is a form of plagiarism, and doing so excessively with citation prevents me from being able to evaluate your knowledge and skill relevant to this assessment. Use of generative text tools such as those powered by AI to draft portions of your assignment in words that are not your own is also a failure to use your own words and is a violation of this obligation.

This assignment will be due for submission no later than on Sunday, 8^th December at 6 pm. I encourage you to commence your work on this assignment immediately, and to aim to complete it well in advance of this date and time. To submit this assignment, you must email it to my DCU email address, paul.maier@dcu.ie, and I must receive it by the date and time listed above. My email records will be the dispositive record of this.

I will provide you a number of other documents along with this assignment paper which may be relevant to you, including:

1. The OSCOLA Ireland citation guide
2. The DCU School of Law and Government Undergraduate Essay Marking Scheme
3. The DCU School of Law and Government Extension Policy
4. The DCU School of Law and Government Lateness Policy
5. The DCU Academic Integrity Policy
6. “Guide to writing essays and dissertations in the social sciences” by Dr Eoin O’Malley of the DCU School of Law and Government

Question

Subsection 3(2) of the Assisted Decision-Making (Capacity) Act 2015 provides: “A person lacks the capacity to make a decision if he or she is unable-

• to understand the information relevant to the decision,
• to retain that information long enough to make a voluntary choice,
• to use or weigh that information as part of the process of making the decision, or
• to communicate his or her decision (whether by talking, writing, using sign language, assistive technology, or any other means) or, if the implementation of the decision requires the act of a third party, to communicate by any means with that third party.”

Compare this provision with the common law rules related to contracts, both in terms of the ability to void a contract and the ability to claim undue influence or unconscionable bargain.