The UK Department for Business and Trade has commissioned two reviews of the franchising sector — one domestic study with the British Franchise Association and one international comparison through the Centre for Economic Policy Research. Both will inform potential new legislation aimed at protecting franchisees from power imbalances baked into standard franchise agreements. The reviews follow a Guardian investigation last December that revealed allegations surrounding Adrian Howe, a former Vodafone employee who agreed to start a franchise in 2018 and was found drowned days before his store was due to open. His relatives said he had become convinced the deal would prove financially disastrous. Two additional former Vodafone franchisees told the Guardian that commission cuts by the company in 2020 caused their businesses to run up huge debts, which they each said contributed to them making attempts on their own lives. Sixty-two former Vodafone franchisees brought a High Court claim in 2024 alleging the company "unjustly enriched" itself — a case MPs compared to the Post Office Horizon IT scandal. In July 2025, Vodafone settled the 19-month-old claim via a confidential agreement "without any admission of liability." Vodafone has called comparisons to the Post Office scandal "wholly inappropriate" and said it "wholly rejects" any suggestion it knowingly or recklessly put franchisees under unreasonable pressure. The structural problem is straightforward. UK franchise law treats the relationship between a franchisee running a single mobile phone shop and a FTSE 100 multinational as a contract between equals. In practice, the franchise agreement itself formalises the power imbalance: the franchisor sets commission rates, controls branding, and can alter terms. Former Conservative minister John Hayes told Parliament in July 2025 that franchising "can be used as a method to exaggerate the power of the business at the heart of the franchise and to weaken the position of franchisees," asserting this is "common and particular in the case of Vodafone." Lord Leong has been assigned franchising as part of his portfolio as minister for small business and enterprise. Prime Minister Keir Starmer pledged in January to review franchise laws as part of the official response to the Howe case. Howe's family continues to press for an "Adrian's Law" to introduce new franchise regulations. The government says it wants to "ensure franchisees are properly protected, while avoiding unnecessary burdens on small businesses." Vodafone maintains it runs "a successful franchise operation of over 350 stores" and says many existing franchisees have expanded by taking on additional locations. The company encourages everyone to raise issues and says it will "always seek to resolve them." The confidential settlement means the court never ruled on the merits of the 62 franchisees' claims. The tension at the heart of this story is familiar: a system designed around theoretical equality between contracting parties masks actual inequality enforced through structural leverage. Whether the government's reviews produce regulation with teeth — or another round of consultations that protect the status quo — depends entirely on whether the international comparison study is allowed to recommend the kind of franchise-specific disclosure and conduct rules that exist in Australia, the US, and parts of Europe.
