Minister for Small Business, Craig Emerson, has announced the establishment of an expert panel on franchising and unconscionable conduct.

The panel will provide advice to the government on some outstanding issues raised in recent parliamentary inquiries into the Franchising Code of Conduct and the provisions of the Trade Practices Act 1974 that prohibit unconscionable conduct.

Professor Bryan Horrigan, law academic at Macquarie University, David Lieberman, a mediation panellist with the Franchise Code of Conduct and the Services Providers Action Network and Ray Steinwall, member of the Australian Competition Tribunal and the Commonwealth Consumer Affairs Advisory Council, have all been appointed to the panel.

The panel members have a well-acknowledged expertise in various aspects of trade practices law, Emerson said. Their backgrounds and experiences make them ideally placed to consider the issues before them.

The merits of proposals for enhancing the provisions of the law that protect small businesses from anti-competitive behaviour will be considered by the panel.

In the specific context of franchising, the panel will be considering the merits and the feasibility of introducing into the Franchising Code a list of examples of behaviours that are inappropriate in franchising relationships. Such behaviours include unforeseen capital expenditure, unilateral contract variation, attribution of legal costs and confidentiality agreements.