Express Terms in UK Law

In my opinion these principles are not applicable in their full rigour when considering the effect of clauses merely limiting liability. Such clauses will of course be read contra proferentem and must be clearly expressed, but there is no reason why they should be judged by the specially exacting standards which are applied to exclusion and indemnity clauses.

It must follow, in my view, that, when asked to review such a decision on appeal, the appellate court should treat the original decision with the utmost respect and refrain from interference with it unless satisfied that it proceeded upon some erroneous principle or was plainly and obviously wrong.

The more valuable the right the clearer the language would need to be. Similarly, the more significant the departure from obligations implied by the law or ordinarily assumed under contracts of the kind in question, the more difficult it would be to persuade the court that the parties intended that result.

It is, however, a fundamental consideration in the construction of contracts of this kind, that it is inherently improbable that one party to the contract should intend to absolve the other party from the consequences of the latter's own negligence.