Extending unfair contract term protections to small businesses – legislation

The Government has committed to extend the consumer unfair contract term protections to small businesses.

The Government has released for public consultation the exposure draft legislation to give effect to the extension.

The Government finalised the design of these protections, in conjunction with the states and territories, following a 10 week consultation process in mid-2014. The Decision Regulation Impact Statement explains in detail why an extension of consumer unfair contract term protections to low-value contracts is the Government’s preferred approach for dealing with unfair terms in small business contracts.

Accompanying the exposure draft legislation are explanatory materials, outlining the main provisions of the exposure draft legislation and explaining the rationale behind them. For a brief overview, see the Fact Sheet.