The Victorian Government has published a guidance note that addresses some of the key areas of debate arising out of the COVID-19 Omnibus (Emergency Measures) (Commercial Leases and Licences) Regulations 2020 (Regulations) and the Act and Code that preceded it. A copy of Victoria’s commercial tenancies relief scheme: Policy guidance on eligible participants and documentation requirements is available here: Guideline. It is […]

The Victorian Small Business Commission has published a FAQ guideline on the operation of the COVID-19 Omnibus (Emergency Measures) (Commercial Leases and Licences) Regulations 2020 (Vic). The Commission’s FAQs are available here: https://www.vsbc.vic.gov.au/fact-sheets-and-resources/faqs/ The FAQs address many the important questions that practitioners are asking about the Regulations.  All practitioners dealing with applications for rent relief (whether […]

In an earlier note I suggested that the landlord needs to offer to its tenant an extension of the lease term by up to 24 months.  However, it has been pointed out to me that the extension that the landlord needs to offer may be less than that. Regulation 13 states that (emphasis added): Extension […]

Click to access Australian%20Jurisdictions%20responses%20to%20COVID-19-5May2020.pdf

Well, the new Regulations contain a few surprises with some wins for each of landlords and tenants respectively. The Regulations broadly follow the scheme of the Code with a number of notable exceptions. Abi and my preliminary comments are set out below. First, as expected, the Regulations operate for the period 29 March 2020 to […]

The COVID-19 Omnibus (Emergency Measures) (Commercial Leases and Licences) Regulations 2020 (Vic) have just been published and are available here: Omnibus Regs Abi and I will write a summary shortly.

For those who have not seen it but still want to, here is the link to last week’s webinar that Abilene Singh and I presented: https://www.greenslist.com.au/media/Coronavirus-and-Victorian-retail-and-commercial-tenancies Links to our slides and the Commonwealth Code are attached to the last couple of posts on this blog, which you should have to hand when viewing the webinar. […]

The New South Wales government has produced regulations to give effect to the National Cabinet Mandatory Code of Conduct for landlords and tenants. We have not yet see the Victorian equivalent and it is not clear whether Victoria’s regulations will follow a similar model or take a different approach.  However, it is already apparent that […]

To add to my technical woes today, my PowerPoint slides did not attach to my last post. Here they are: COVID-19 webinar (24 April 2020) After the technophobic day that I have had, all I can say is … TGIF! Stay safe and keep practicing your social distancing, folks.

OK, so we had some technical problems in today’s webinar.  Thanks for those who attended and sorry we left you hanging on the line. We recorded the webinar and it is being edited.  We expect to post it in the next few days.  I will post a link when it is available. In the meantime, […]