ABSTRACT
The willingness of the courts to intervene and ‘police’ a bargain, however apparently freely made, was stated in the previous chapter to turn on questions of procedural unfairness, substantive unfairness or (perhaps) both.1 This section illustrates perhaps better than any other area of the law the tension between traditional notions of contractual freedom, based on the classical model, and the need to ensure that the freedom to contract does not become a licence to exploit superior contractual bargaining strength.2 At some points, the courts (and, more recently, Parliament) have focused on procedural issues, at others on substantive issues.3
