Today is historic for small business people and the Australian economy.
Today (9 November 2023) is the start of the new ‘beefed up’ unfair contract laws. These new laws have real ‘teeth’:
- Businesses that ignore or breach the laws can suffer fines of up to $50 million.
- Loopholes have been closed to stop businesses getting around the laws by making minor changes to their contracts and so on. The courts have wide powers to close unforeseen ‘loopholes’.
Have no doubt that these laws are a game-changer for small business people. It’s much bigger than most people realise.
And big businesses are responding. If they don’t, they are in trouble. We’re aware of at least a dozen big-name companies who have just released ‘upgrades’ to their standard form contracts.
We’ve prepared a two-page summary of the laws. Read it. You need to be aware of your rights and these protections. We provide a link to the government regulators (ACCC and ASIC) who enforce the laws.
And we think that we are entitled to claim a big chunk of credit for these laws coming into being.
- We started campaigning for the laws in 2009.
- It was a long, lonely, persistent seven-year campaign.
- We were strongly opposed by some of the most powerful Australian big business lobbyists.
- Success came in 2016 with the first laws for small business people.
- Now, ultimate success—the laws with ‘teeth’ start today.
Of course, no-one does anything on their own. There was political support from politicians on all sides of parliament. Our huge thanks to The Australian business journalist, Robert Gottliebsen. He’s a champion of small business. But we can say that, without our campaigning, these small business protections would not be in place today.
The full story is here, showing our campaign back to 2009.
This is what we at Self-Employed Australia do. We focus on the long-term and are damn persistent.
We are delighted with today’s historic event.
But now we are focusing on defending your right to be you own boss. It’s staggering that we have to do this. The Albanese government’s Loophole Bill is the greatest attack upon small business people that Australia has seen. Here’s our campaign page.
Tomorrow (10 November 2023) I’m giving evidence before the Senate Committee that is reviewing the Loophole Bill. We’re being quite specific about the sections of the Bill that must be defeated if small business people are to exist in Australia.
Our submission to the Senate Inquiry is here (number 160). It’s big! But the issues are massive.
More soon.