On 1 April 2025, the Franchising Code of Conduct will sunset if not remade.  

A comprehensive review of the Code was undertaken in 2023, making 23 recommendations for change.  In response, the Government has moved to implement a new Code, adopting 11 of these recommendations.  The new Code keeps the same structure as the previous Code, but substantially re-writes (and re-numbers) many of its provisions.  

Franchisors will welcome many changes, including simplified disclosure obligations, strengthened termination rights for serious breach, and "opt-out provisions" and removing regulatory requirements for renewing franchises.  

Franchisees will welcome a new right to have a reasonable opportunity to make a return on their investment during the term of the agreement, a broader prohibition against restraints of trade in certain circumstances, an expanded right of compensation for early termination, expansion of disclosure obligations concerning "marketing funds" to apply to any "special purpose funds", a revised definition of "motor vehicle dealership", increased financial penalties for breach, and a new right for the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman to "name and shame" franchisors who have not participated meaningfully in ADR.  

These are significant forms which it will be important for all practitioners dealing with the franchise sector to understand.

Presenters

Derek Minus, Barrister, Mediation & Arbitration Chambers
Derek Minus is a barrister-at-law with a specialist practice as a dispute resolver. He holds accreditation as variously a Mediator, Arbitrator, Expert Determiner and Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner (FDRP). He was an early adopter of mediation in 1992 and is a Nationally Accredited Mediator who has as conducted over 4,000 mediations and conciliations across all types of disputes. Derek is also graded a Chartered Arbitrator and trained as an International Commercial Arbitrator by the CIArb (UK). Since 2000, he has acted as an arbitrator with variously; the NSW Local Court, District Court, NCAT, Workers Compensation Commission and for the NSW State government. For the two year period 2017/2018, he was appointed by the Commonwealth Government as the Franchising Code Mediation Adviser with responsibility for arranging the dispute resolution processes under the Franchising Code of Conduct, a prescribed code under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010. He is currently providing an automated process for engaging mediators throughout Australia for the resolution of franchising disputes at: www.franchisingcode.com.au


Josh Simons, Partner, Thomson Geer
Josh Simons is an IP and competition & consumer law specialist. Josh's competition practice encompasses competition and regulatory issues affecting mergers, commercial supply arrangements and dealings with consumers. Clients seek Josh's advice on dealings with the ACCC and other regulators, and he regularly conducts compliance training and presents seminars on competition and consumer law issues. Josh has been Deputy Chair of the Law Council's Competition and Consumer Law Committee since 2012. He led the Committee's working group on the extension of unfair contracts terms provisions to small business contracts, and attended a number of meetings with Commonwealth Treasury on the development of the new legislation., Josh is recognised by Best Lawyers as a leading competition and regulatory lawyer, and has twice been named Regulatory Lawyer of the Year in the SA market.


Elizabeth Gore-Jones, Founding Partner, The Franchise & Business Lawyers
Elizabeth Gore-Jones was admitted in 1994 and commenced specialising in franchising law in 2000. She started the law firm "The Franchise & Business Lawyers" in 2012 specialising in providing commercial, business and franchising advice to franchisors and franchisees alike. She is a member of the Queensland Law Society Franchising Committee and is a past member of the Franchise Council of Australia, the Queensland chapter of the Franchise Council committee and the Women in Franchising committee. Elizabeth lectures at the Bond University PLT course in franchise legal practice. Elizabeth has a particular interest in setting up new franchise systems and assisting franchisees in dispute to reach an agreement without resorting to the court system. Elizabeth advises Franchisors ranging from large Australia wide franchisors through to the smaller franchise systems. As franchising law becomes more complex, Elizabeth is called upon to assist legal practices in representing their clients.


Simone Pentis, Managing Director, Advantage Partners Lawyers
Managing Director of Advantage Partners Lawyers, Simone brings a background of extensive experience as a corporate and commercial lawyer having worked in private legal practice, universities and in-house positions at Australian and international companies. Simone has acted for various national and international franchisors within Australia, assisted franchise groups move into various international markets, and acquire other international and Australian systems. Simone has also assisted master franchisees and franchisees as they acquire and deal with their franchises. Simone managed and operated the legal departments for national and international franchise networks, including The Coffee Club Group and Bartercard, and is Deputy Chair of the QLD Law Society’s Franchising Committee, as well as a long standing committee member of both the Franchise Council of Australia (Qld Chapter) and Franchise Council of Australia Legal Committee.


Dr Katherine Johnson, Director, Unilegal Consulting
Katherine is an internationally and nationally accredited mediator, serving on various mediation panels including the International Mediation Institute (IMI), Papua New Guinea Supreme Court (PNG), the Supreme Court of NSW, the Personal Injury Commission of NSW and the Family Law Settlement Service Panel (FLSS) of the Federal Circuit Court of Australia as a Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner (FDRP). For over twenty-five years, Katherine has been and still is, a practising registered research psychologist and barrister and a nationally accredited mediator. She has combined her skills to form Unilegal Consulting Pty. Ltd through which she still practises as a mediator and as a Guardian Ad Litem (GAL) for the Department of Communities and Justice in NSW. Katherine also teaches mediation courses and trains mediators internationally and nationally. Katherine’s extensive practice in Psychology, Law and Education has led her to find common ground between the fields culminating in her PhD in Law from Macquarie University in 2015 which was published in 2018. She has combined the insights from the field of Loss and grief in Psychology to the practical resolution of disputes in Law. In her thesis, she has developed an interdisciplinary approach, which transforms Dispute Resolution into an agent for social change. Her use of mediation as a process of social constructionism in action empowers parties to constructively respond to their own crises/losses as agents for their own social change. Katherine has been called a ‘pracademic’ because of her attempts not only to constructively implement in her practice what theory teaches us academically, but also to learn from practice what can be generalised as a grounded researcher to become academic knowledge.