Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the minister for his response. I am grateful. It is good that one part of it will be dealt with. This whole legislation is about unfair contract terms, but you can have something that is transparently unfair—it is transparent but it is unfair. Just because it is out there and unfair does not take into account the disparity in bargaining power between the two. It is in the fine print, as National Legal Aid pointed out in their arguments about the concept of transparency and about consumers being able to make informed choices about contract terms because of what happens in the real world and the way these terms are drafted. My question to the minister is: was ‘transparency’ included in the exposure draft of this bill or has the concept of transparency been added since the exposure draft?