ABSTRACT
The approach to contractual arrangements for building in post-war Britain has been characterised by a period of stability, during which standard building and consultancy contracts have been built around established procedures and traditions. These standard contracts have been extensively documented in various texts (e.g. Chappell and Powell-Smith, 1997; Cox and Thompson, 1998; Murdoch and Hughes, 2000), are generally well understood by the participants, and importantly have been (regularly) tested in the courts. As documents they are now more than simply the expression of the legal intention of the parties; they have become (amongst other things) procedural manuals that provide an agenda for the actions of the various actors in a construction project.
