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Unfair Contract Terms Directive, link , Unfair Contract Terms Directive, Article 1

On 22 April 2022, the Government published and introduced into Parliament the Consumer Rights Bill 2022

which in Part 6 sets out a proposed statutory framework that seeks

• to repeal existing consumer legislation on unfair terms (i.e. European Communities (Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts) Regulations 1995, S.I. No. 27/1995, as amended, which transposes Directive 1993/13 on unfair terms into Irish law) and

• to replace it with updated provisions in national law.

In light of the minimum harmonising nature of Directive 1993/13, Part 6 also seeks to augment and clarify certain consumer rights in relation to unfair terms by:

• expanding its application to both negotiated and non-negotiated (or standard) terms (s.127);

• providing clarification concerning contract terms that are exempt from an assessment for unfairness (core-terms) to ensure that such terms are not interpreted too broadly, in line with rulings of the Court of Justice (s.131(3));

• including a new ‘blacklist’ of nine terms which are always unfair (s.132);

• providing clarification around the transparency requirements in relation to contract terms, in line with jurisprudence from the Court of Justice (s.134);

• including a ‘greylist’ of terms which are presumed to be unfair (s.133 and Schedule 5);

• expressly recognising the court’s duty to consider whether a term is unfair, of its own motion (s.136).