Australia has a mature and heavily used class action regime. There is no single national collective-redress statute. Instead, materially uniform opt-out regimes operate in parallel in the Federal Court and five State Supreme Courts, each contained in a dedicated Part of a procedural statute and all modelled on the federal template:

• Federal Court of Australia: Part IVA of the Federal Court of Australia Act 1976 (Cth) (ss 33A-33ZJ), in force since 4 March 1992;
• Supreme Court of Victoria: Part 4A of the Supreme Court Act 1986 (Vic), from 2000;
• Supreme Court of New South Wales: Part 10 of the Civil Procedure Act 2005 (NSW), from 2011;
• Supreme Court of Queensland: Part 13A of the Civil Proceedings Act 2011 (Qld), from 2017;
• Supreme Court of Western Australia: the Civil Procedure (Representative Proceedings) Act 2022 (WA), from 2023; and
• Supreme Court of Tasmania: Part VII of the Supreme Court Civil Procedure Act 1932 (Tas), with rules and a practice direction from 2019.

South Australia, the ACT and the Northern Territory have no dedicated regime, although each superior court retains the older “same interest” representative-action rule for parties with a genuinely common interest.

The regimes share a common architecture. A proceeding may be commenced where seven or more persons have claims against the same person, arising out of the same, similar or related circumstances, that give rise to a substantial common issue of law or fact. There is no certification requirement. The model is opt-out, group members are bound by the outcome unless they opt out, and no settlement or discontinuance is effective without court approval. The conduct of class actions is further shaped by detailed practice notes (such as the Federal Court’s Class Actions Practice Note, GPN-CA), an active litigation funding market and, uniquely in Victoria, the availability of lawyer contingency fees through “group costs orders”.

Part IVA of the Federal Court of Australia Act 1976 (Cth) was enacted following the Australian Law Reform Commission’s report Grouped Proceedings in the Federal Court (ALRC Report No 46, 1988) and commenced on 4 March 1992. The ALRC identified three policy rationales that Parliament and the High Court have consistently affirmed: enhancing access to justice for claimants whose individual claims would be uneconomic to litigate, promoting judicial and economic efficiency by resolving common issues once in a single binding proceeding, and deterrence, by exposing wrongdoers to aggregate liability and so encouraging compliance with the law (see Wong v Silkfield Pty Ltd (1999) 199 CLR 255 and Mobil Oil Australia Pty Ltd v Victoria (2002) 211 CLR 1).

Two further developments have shaped the regime’s modern character. The first was the High Court’s confirmation in Campbells Cash and Carry Pty Ltd v Fostif Pty Ltd (2006) 229 CLR 386 that third-party litigation funding is not, of itself, an abuse of process or contrary to public policy, which catalysed a substantial funded class action market. The second was the progressive adoption of the federal template by the States (Victoria in 2000, New South Wales in 2011, Queensland in 2017 and Western Australia in 2023), together with Victoria’s introduction of lawyer contingency fees (group costs orders) in 2020. Together these have made Australia one of the most active class action jurisdictions outside North America.

Class actions are an established feature of Australian litigation, with more than 1,000 filed since the regime began in 1992. After a relatively subdued 2024, filings rebounded strongly in 2025, which ranks among the busiest years on record for new filings.

The mix of claims has broadened well beyond the shareholder and financial-services claims that dominated the period after the 2018 Royal Commission. Consumer claims, especially product, automotive and other Australian Consumer Law claims, remain a core category, alongside a marked rise in employment and underpayment claims and growing numbers of data-breach and privacy, government-liability and ESG claims.

Pure securities filings softened in number for a period but have been revived by recent appellate successes for shareholders. In particular, after a long run in which corporate defendants prevailed on causation and loss, beginning with the Myer judgment in 2019, the momentum has swung back toward shareholders. In Southernwood v Brambles Ltd (No 3) [2026] FCA 418, shareholders succeeded on liability, causation and loss for the first time in Australia, and shortly after in Crowley v Worley Ltd [2026] FCAFC 78 the Full Federal Court endorsed market-based causation and a flexible, facilitation-principle approach to loss. These decisions are expected to revive earnings-guidance claims and to reshape settlement dynamics.

Settlement values reached record highs in 2025: the ten largest settlements totalled about A$1.6 billion, up roughly a third on the previous year, and seven of them exceeded A$100 million, including the A$548.5 million Robodebt settlement, the largest in Australian history.

The Federal Court is the most common venue, though not as a matter of jurisdictional necessity. State Supreme Courts are invested with federal jurisdiction under s 39(2) of the Judiciary Act 1903 (Cth) and have concurrent jurisdiction over the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) and Australian Consumer Law (Schedule 2 to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth)) claims that underpin most class actions, so those claims can be, and frequently are, brought in State courts. The Federal Court’s prevalence reflects its specialist class actions list and national reach rather than any requirement. The Supreme Court of Victoria is the most significant and fastest-growing alternative, driven by the availability of group costs orders (contingency fees) since 2020, and proceedings have recently been filed, for the first time, in all six regimes.

By subject matter, the most prevalent categories are consumer and product liability, securities and shareholder claims (continuous disclosure and misleading-or-deceptive-conduct claims), financial services and financial products, employment and underpayment, government and public-authority liability, and, increasingly, data, privacy and ESG. Cartel and competition class actions have historically been comparatively rare, but they are an emerging growth area following the Federal Court’s 2025 findings against Apple and Google over their app marketplaces. Securities and shareholder claims remain disproportionately significant in value and, after a long run of defendant wins, have been revived by recent appellate successes for shareholders.

Australian statutes do not use the term “class action”. The statutory term is “representative proceeding” or “group proceeding”: a single proceeding commenced by one or more representative parties who each have a claim in their own right, on behalf of a defined group of seven or more persons who are not named as parties (“group members”), where the claims arise out of the same, similar or related circumstances and give rise to at least one substantial common issue of law or fact. “Class action” and “class member” are used interchangeably with “representative proceeding” and “group member” in practice and in the courts’ own practice notes. The defining features are that the proceeding is representative (group members take no active part), opt-out (members are bound unless they opt out), and subject to close court supervision, notably at settlement.

Factually, the typical trigger is an event or course of conduct that causes the same or similar loss to a large number of people. Common precipitating events include a corporate disclosure failure or profit downgrade that moves the share price, a product defect or safety recall, a mass personal-injury or environmental event such as a bushfire, flood or contamination, a systemic consumer or contractual practice such as undisclosed fees or mis-sold insurance, a large-scale data breach, and systemic employment practices such as underpayment or unpaid overtime.

Very often the practical trigger is a public revelation, such as a regulator’s investigation or enforcement action, a media investigation, a parliamentary or royal commission inquiry, or admissions in a related proceeding, that surfaces conduct affecting a definable group. Litigation funders and plaintiff firms actively monitor these signals. For many funded actions the operative trigger is the assessment that there is a viable common claim, an identifiable respondent of substance, and a group large enough to make the proceeding economic.

Regulatory enforcement is one of the most important leading indicators of class action risk in Australia. Many of the largest class actions have followed, and built upon, the work of regulators such as ASIC, the ACCC, APRA and the OAIC, or public inquiries, most notably the 2018 Hayne Royal Commission into the financial services industry, which generated a wave of follow-on class actions.

Australia does not have a general statutory follow-on class action procedure. In competition and consumer matters, however, statutory evidentiary provisions can materially assist follow-on claims. Section 83 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) and section 137H of the Australian Consumer Law allow findings of fact, and in some cases admissions, made in specified regulator proceedings to be used as prima facie evidence in later compensation proceedings against the same person. Outside those provisions the interaction is principally practical: regulator investigations, admissions, agreed facts and judgments can de-risk a class action, but liability, causation and loss remain to be proved.

Almost any civil cause of action can be pursued collectively, provided the s 33C threshold is met, because the regime is a procedural vehicle rather than a source of substantive rights. The bases most commonly relied on are statutory: misleading or deceptive conduct and continuous disclosure contraventions. Other frequent bases include statutory consumer guarantees and unconscionable-conduct provisions, negligence and other torts (including personal injury, nuisance and contamination), breach of contract, breach of trust and fiduciary duty (common in superannuation and financial-product claims), breach of directors’ and trustees’ duties, competition contraventions such as cartel conduct and misuse of market power under Part IV of the Competition and Consumer Act, and restitution or unjust enrichment. Tortious class actions remain significant, including against public authorities: in the Sydney Light Rail class action, the High Court held Transport for NSW liable to affected businesses and landowners in private nuisance (Hunt Leather Pty Ltd v Transport for NSW [2025] HCA 53).

From 10 June 2025, a new statutory tort for serious invasions of privacy (Privacy Act 1988 (Cth), Schedule 2) provides a further potential basis for data-breach claims. The tort is not a strict-liability or negligence-based data-breach remedy. A plaintiff must still satisfy its statutory elements, including the seriousness threshold and a fault requirement of intention or recklessness.

There are few categorical limitations. The principal constraints are the s 33C threshold itself (seven or more persons, common circumstances and a substantial common issue) and the court’s “declassing” powers (ss 33L, 33M, 33N), which allow a proceeding to be discontinued as a class action where, for example, the cost of distribution to group members would exceed the likely benefit, or where a class action is not an efficient or appropriate means of resolving the claims.

Claims requiring highly individualised assessment, such as individual reliance or personal-injury causation and quantum, can still be brought collectively, but the individual issues are typically hived off for separate or sub-group determination once the common questions are resolved. In practice, claims dominated by individual issues with little genuine commonality are vulnerable to a declassing application under s 33N.

A representative proceeding is commenced by a representative party who must have a claim in their own right and a sufficient interest to commence the proceeding on their own behalf. The representative is usually an affected consumer, investor, employee or other claimant, and corporations can and do act as lead applicants. Group members need not be named and need not consent to be included.

Australia does not use the “qualified entity” or designated-body model found in the EU Representative Actions Directive. Standing is claimant-based, not vested in consumer associations or public bodies as such, although a body that itself holds a claim, such as a corporate investor, may act as representative. The representative carries the conduct of the proceeding, owes duties to group members, and is the party exposed to adverse costs.

There is no nationality or domicile restriction on group membership. Non-residents (e.g., foreign investors) can be group members in a Part IVA proceeding: because a non-resident may be the representative party, there is no basis to confine group membership to Australian residents. Foreign claimants are therefore routinely included in Australian class actions, particularly securities claims involving globally traded securities. The practical limits are jurisdictional, concerning service and enforcement rather than the claimant’s nationality.

The group must comprise at least seven persons. There is no upper limit, and classes can run to hundreds of thousands of members. The group must be defined by objective criteria so that membership can be determined, but it need not be closed, and members need not be named or numbered at commencement. Both “open” classes (all persons meeting the definition) and “closed” classes (only those who have entered a funding or retainer agreement) are permitted, although courts have discouraged narrowly closed classes that fragment a single controversy.

“Book-building”, the practice of signing group members to funding or retainer agreements, is permitted and common, but it is increasingly less central because the regime is opt-out and the courts have developed mechanisms (common fund orders and, in Victoria, group costs orders) that allow funders and lawyers to be remunerated from the whole class rather than only signed-up members. There is no prohibition on advertising for or soliciting group members, subject to the professional-conduct rules governing legal practitioners and to the courts’ supervision of communications with group members, with the practice notes regulating the form and content of notices. Funders are no longer treated as operating a managed investment scheme (see the funding section below), which has simplified class-sourcing. Where rival firms or funders assemble competing books over the same controversy, the issue is resolved through a carriage contest.

Class actions are heard in the Federal Court of Australia and in the Supreme Courts of Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania, under the regimes listed above. State Supreme Courts are invested with federal jurisdiction and hear federal-law class actions, so the choice of court is largely a matter of practice. Each court operates a dedicated class actions or group proceedings list and an individual docket system, so that a single judge manages the proceeding from filing to judgment. The Federal Court hears the majority of class actions, with the Supreme Court of Victoria the principal and growing alternative because of the group costs order regime.

The main jurisdictional issues are the allocation of proceedings between courts and the management of competing class actions, rather than barriers to access. Where the same controversy attracts competing class actions in different courts, they may be transferred and consolidated using the cross-vesting legislation and inter-court protocols.

The High Court has recently confirmed that a Victorian group costs order cannot travel with a proceeding transferred to another State, and the absence of that funding mechanism in the destination court is relevant to, and may be decisive against, a transfer application (Bogan v Smedley [2025] HCA 7), which strongly incentivises funded proceedings to remain in Victoria.

Australia adopts an opt-out model. The court must fix a date by which group members may opt out by written notice, and those who do not opt out are bound by the judgment or approved settlement. The opt-out model is supplemented by registration or “soft class closure” mechanisms, under which group members who wish to share in a settlement may be required to register by a specified date, with the consequences of non-registration ultimately controlled by the court at settlement approval. The High Court has confirmed the availability of such orders, holding that they regulate participation in settlement distribution and do not undermine the opt-out model. Closed classes, limited to those who have signed up, are also permitted at commencement, but the default and predominant model is the opt-out open class.

A representative proceeding is commenced like any other proceeding, by originating application supported by a statement of claim or pleading, but the originating process must additionally (a) describe or otherwise identify the group members, (b) specify the nature of the claims made and the relief claimed, and (c) specify the questions of law or fact common to the group members’ claims. It is not necessary to name the group members or to specify their number. The seven-person threshold and common-issue requirements must be satisfied. There is no certification or leave requirement and no pre-action gateway, and the proceeding continues as a class action unless and until the court orders otherwise. Court practice notices impose additional practical requirements, including early provision of details of any litigation funding and costs arrangements.

Key mandatory requirements include court approval of any settlement or discontinuance, court-approved notice to group members at important stages (including notice of the right to opt out and of any proposed settlement), and the fixing of an opt-out date, together with adherence to the court’s case-management directions under the relevant practice note. In funded matters, the lead applicant and funder will ordinarily be required to disclose the funding agreement, in redacted form, and the litigation budget to the court, and security for the respondent’s costs is commonly ordered. The court’s protective supervision of group members’ interests, particularly at settlement and in reviewing legal costs and any funding commission, is a defining mandatory feature.

Both. The dedicated Part, for example Part IVA, supplies the special machinery unique to representative proceedings, including the commencement threshold, opt-out, common-question determination, sub-groups, settlement approval, binding effect and suspension of limitation periods. Outside that machinery, the ordinary rules of civil procedure of the relevant court apply (pleadings, discovery, evidence, interlocutory applications and costs), supplemented by a specialised class actions practice note in each court that tailors case management to the representative context.

Class actions are substantial pieces of litigation and typically run for several years. A relatively straightforward matter that settles may resolve in around two to three years, contested matters that proceed to trial and appeal commonly take five years or more, and the largest or most complex matters (mass torts, contamination and long-running securities claims) can take longer still. The opt-out structure, the need for court-approved notices, mediation, settlement approval and, frequently, a separate distribution phase all extend timelines.

Because the regime is a procedural vehicle for existing causes of action, the full range of civil remedies is available. On judgment the court may determine common questions, make declarations of liability, grant equitable relief (including injunctions), and award damages, including damages to group or sub-group members in specified amounts, in amounts worked out as the court directs, or as an aggregate sum without individual assessment. The court may also establish and administer a fund for the receipt and distribution of damages or settlement monies and approve a distribution scheme. Compensation is the predominant remedy in practice, with declaratory and injunctive relief featuring in consumer and ESG-related matters.

Damages are assessed according to the substantive cause of action relied upon, so there is no special class-action measure. Tortious claims attract the tortious measure, contractual claims the expectation or reliance measure, and statutory misleading-conduct claims the loss suffered because of the conduct. In securities claims, the central and heavily litigated question is the measure and proof of loss caused by the contravention, including whether “market-based causation”, reliance on the integrity of the market price, is available as an alternative to proof of individual reliance. In 2026 the Full Federal Court endorsed market-based causation and a flexible, facilitation-principle approach to quantifying loss in Crowley v Worley Ltd [2026] FCAFC 78, and the High Court is due to consider causation and loss in shareholder claims in June 2026. The regime also permits aggregate damages awards without individual assessment where a reasonably accurate assessment of the total can be made.

Exemplary or punitive damages are available in Australia only in limited circumstances and are not a feature of most class actions. They may be awarded in tort for conduct involving a conscious and contumelious disregard of the plaintiff’s rights, but they are not available under the Australian Consumer Law or for most statutory misleading-conduct claims, and several jurisdictions prohibit exemplary damages in personal-injury negligence claims under their civil-liability legislation. Because the dominant class action causes of action are statutory (consumer and securities) or contractual, exemplary damages rarely arise, and there is no concept of United States-style treble or multiplied damages.

Class actions are case-managed and tried by a single judge under the court’s individual docket system. In the Federal Court a designated class actions management judge, supported in appropriate cases by a Class Actions Registrar, handles the proceeding from filing through trial and settlement approval. Appeals are heard by a Full Court (three or, occasionally, five judges) of the Federal Court or a State Court of Appeal and, ultimately and by special leave, by the High Court of Australia. It is unusual for more than one judge to manage a first-instance class action.

Juries play effectively no role in Australian class actions. Civil trials in the Federal Court are heard by a judge alone, and although some State courts retain civil juries in principle, the scale and complexity of class actions mean they are, as a matter of practice, never tried by jury. Class actions are determined by judges, who also perform the protective settlement-approval function.

Yes. A representative proceeding cannot be settled or discontinued without the approval of the court, and once approved the settlement binds all group members who have not opted out. The court will approve a settlement only if satisfied that it is fair and reasonable as between the parties and, critically, fair and reasonable and in the interests of the group members as a whole, not merely in the interests of the representative and the respondent. Approval is typically accompanied by court approval of a settlement distribution scheme governing how the settlement sum is allocated among group members, and by court scrutiny, and where appropriate reduction, of legal costs and any litigation-funding commission. Court-approved notice of the proposed settlement must ordinarily be given to group members before approval.

Judicial oversight is extensive and is one of the defining features of the Australian regime. Because absent group members are bound but not separately represented at the approval hearing, the court acts in a protective, supervisory capacity over their interests. The court may, and in larger or conflicted settlements often does, appoint an independent contradictor or referee to test the fairness of a proposed settlement and the reasonableness of deductions. It scrutinises the proposed legal costs, often by reference to an independent costs assessment, and reviews any funding commission, with power to reduce it and to order funding-equalisation so that the burden of reasonable costs and commission is shared across all who benefit. The court also supervises administration of the distribution scheme.

There is no statutory requirement to undertake a prescribed form of out-of-court ADR before or during a class action, and no specific format is mandated by the class action statutes. In practice, however, mediation is effectively universal. The courts have broad powers to refer proceedings to mediation, and routinely do so, frequently more than once. The practice notes encourage early identification of opportunities for mediation, and the overarching case-management obligations require parties to facilitate the just, quick and cheap resolution of disputes. The great majority of class actions that resolve do so by court-approved settlement reached at mediation.

A range of funding models is available, and the choice between them is one of the most distinctive features of Australian practice:

• Third-party litigation funding. A commercial funder pays the legal costs and provides security and an adverse-costs indemnity in return for a commission, historically often in the range of 20 to 30% of the recovery, now commonly sought across the whole class through a common fund order made at settlement or judgment. The High Court confirmed in Kain v R&B Investments Pty Ltd [2025] HCA 28, an appeal arising from the Blue Sky class action, that the Federal Court can make a common fund order in favour of a litigation funder at settlement or judgment.
• Conditional “no win, no fee” costs agreements. Lawyers act on a conditional basis, with a permitted uplift on fees of up to 25% in some jurisdictions, but cannot charge a percentage of the recovery outside Victoria.
• Group costs orders, in Victoria only. Since 1 July 2020 the Supreme Court of Victoria may order that the plaintiff’s lawyers be paid a court-approved percentage of any award or settlement (a contingency fee), with the law firm assuming liability for adverse costs and security (Supreme Court Act 1986 (Vic) s 33ZDA). It is the only lawyer-contingency-fee mechanism in Australia and has made Victoria the forum of choice for many funded actions.

By contrast, the High Court confirmed in Kain that the Federal Court cannot make a “solicitors’ common fund order”, so lawyer contingency-style recovery remains available only through the Victorian group costs order.

Third-party funding is lawful and well established. Maintenance and champerty have been abolished as torts and crimes in most jurisdictions, and since Campbells Cash and Carry Pty Ltd v Fostif Pty Ltd (2006) 229 CLR 386 funding is not contrary to public policy or an abuse of process. The principal regulatory question, whether funded class actions are “managed investment schemes” requiring an AFS licence and product disclosure, has been resolved in favour of the industry. The Full Federal Court held in LCM Funding Pty Ltd v Stanwell Corporation Ltd [2022] FCAFC 103 that a litigation funding scheme is not a managed investment scheme, and the managed-investment, AFSL, product-disclosure and anti-hawking issues were substantially resolved by regulatory amendments in December 2022. Separately, ASIC has extended the operation of its relief instruments for litigation funding arrangements and conditional costs schemes until 31 January 2029.

The real restrictions are now supervisory rather than licensing-based. The court reviews and may reduce funding commissions on settlement, requires disclosure of funding terms, and orders security for costs.

Three business risks dominate the current landscape.

1. Cyber, data security and privacy. After the large-scale Medibank and Optus breaches, and the commencement on 10 June 2025 of a statutory tort for serious invasions of privacy, data-breach class actions and parallel representative complaints to the privacy regulator are one of the fastest-emerging exposures, particularly for entities holding large volumes of sensitive personal information. Recent filings include a class action against icare over a data breach affecting nearly 200,000 claimants.
2. ESG, climate and greenwashing. Intensifying regulator activity on misleading sustainability claims, together with mandatory climate-related financial disclosure phased in from 1 January 2025, is creating fertile ground for both regulator-led actions and follow-on collective claims.
3. Consumer and employment exposure. Broadening consumer-protection claims (product, automotive and financial-product mis-selling) and systemic underpayment and unpaid-overtime claims continue to generate high-volume class action risk across sectors.

Several trends are evident.

First, the diversification of claim types away from shareholder and financial-services claims toward consumer, data and privacy, employment, government-liability and ESG claims.

Second, important High Court guidance on class action funding in 2025. In Kain v R&B Investments Pty Ltd [2025] HCA 28, an appeal arising from the Blue Sky class action, the Court confirmed that the Federal Court can make a common fund order in favour of a commercial litigation funder at settlement or judgment, an important reassurance for funded actions in that court, while holding that it cannot make a solicitors’ common fund order. In Bogan v Smedley [2025] HCA 7 the Court held that a Victorian group costs order cannot travel to another State. The combined effect is that funder common fund orders are available in the Federal Court, while lawyer contingency fees remain confined to Victoria’s group costs order regime, which continues to draw funded work to the Supreme Court of Victoria.

Third, record settlement value, with the ten largest settlements in 2025 totalling about A$1.6 billion, up roughly a third on the previous year, and seven of them exceeding A$100 million.

Fourth, as noted, the recent wins in securities class actions may see a revival of this type of claim.

Fifth, the continued judicial development of class-closure, carriage and funding-approval principles as the courts calibrate the economics of the regime.

Sixth, the emergence of competition class actions, which have historically been rare in Australia. In August 2025 the Federal Court found that Apple and Google had misused their market power, contrary to s 46 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth), in the operation of their app marketplaces, in proceedings heard together with the Epic Games claims and with consumer and developer class actions that also succeeded at first instance, with a relief and damages phase continuing into 2026. Those findings are likely to encourage further digital-platform competition class actions and to provide a road map for existing claims.

The most significant near-term development to watch is the High Court’s hearing, listed for 11 and 12 June 2026, of the Commonwealth Bank appeals (Zonia Holdings Pty Ltd v Commonwealth Bank of Australia Ltd [2025] FCAFC 63 and the companion Baron v Commonwealth Bank of Australia [2025] FCAFC 123, heard together), the first occasion on which the High Court will give guidance on causation, loss and damage in shareholder class actions. The appeals arrive with competing Full Federal Court approaches before the Court: in those decisions the plaintiffs failed on loss, while in Crowley v Worley Ltd [2026] FCAFC 78 the Full Court endorsed market-based causation and a flexible approach to loss. Together with the Brambles result, the High Court’s decision will either consolidate or check a marked shift in momentum toward applicants, in what is shaping up to be the most consequential period for Australian shareholder class actions since the commencement of Part IVA.

Other developments to watch include the appellate fate of the ACCR v Santos greenwashing decision (on appeal from [2026] FCA 96), which will calibrate the boundaries of climate-disclosure liability, the relief and damages phase in the Apple and Google app-marketplace competition proceedings, the continuing debate over whether the Commonwealth should legislate to permit Federal Court contingency fees or early-stage common fund orders to match Victoria, and the bedding-down of the new statutory privacy tort in data-breach litigation.

ESG is one of the most active frontiers, although much of the activity to date has taken the form of regulator-led enforcement that is expected to seed follow-on collective claims. ESG claims are currently being framed in three main ways.

The first is greenwashing claims, generally framed as misleading-or-deceptive-conduct claims, alleging that sustainability, “carbon neutral”, “clean energy” or net-zero representations are misleading or deceptive under the Australian Consumer Law, the ASIC Act and the Corporations Act. The landmark case, although not itself a class action, is Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility v Santos Ltd, the first case globally to challenge the validity of a company’s net-zero pathway, in which the Federal Court dismissed the claim in February 2026 (ACCR v Santos [2026] FCA 96), with an appeal filed in March 2026. Regulators have separately secured record greenwashing penalties, for example against Vanguard (A$12.9 million) and Mercer (A$11.3 million).

The second is climate- and disclosure-based shareholder claims, alleging failure to disclose, or misleading disclosure of, climate-related financial risks, a category likely to expand with mandatory climate reporting from 2025.

The third is environmental contamination and social-pillar claims, including systemic wage underpayment, modern-slavery and consumer-harm claims, large-scale contamination claims such as PFAS “forever chemicals” litigation, and human-rights or environmental claims connected with resource and infrastructure projects.

These cases are generally framed as cases under misleading-conduct, disclosure, directors’-duties and tort principles rather than in any bespoke ESG cause of action.

Reform debate is active. It centres on four issues.

• Whether the Commonwealth should permit contingency fees for lawyers, or early-stage common fund orders, in the Federal Court to match Victoria’s group costs order regime. The 2025 High Court decisions confining contingency-style recovery to Victoria have sharpened that question, and the Government has not announced a settled position but has indicated it is willing to consider it.
• The regulation of litigation funders. After the abandonment of the previous government’s managed-investment-scheme approach and the December 2022 regulatory amendments, there are continuing calls for a bespoke and proportionate funder-regulation and fee-oversight regime.
• The harmonisation of the State and federal regimes and of contingency-fee rules, recommended by the ALRC in 2018 and 2019, which remains substantially unimplemented.
• Targeted procedural reform around class closure, competing class actions and settlement-distribution efficiency, much of which is being developed by the courts case by case rather than by legislation.

The new statutory privacy tort and the mandatory climate-disclosure regime are each likely to drive further calls for procedural adaptation as data and ESG claims grow.