The government is promising the most radical overhaul of consumer rights' law in decades.

The details of a new consumer rights bill have been revealed, with the claim that customers will be given more protection than ever.

If passed, the law will ban expiry dates for gift vouchers and beef up security when shopping online.

It will also cover price information for medical consultations - including GP visits, and will even extend to gambling.

It will replace overlapping and confusing combination of primary, secondary and European legislation currently in place.

Some of the major new rights include:

• Expiry dates: a ban on expiry dates for gift cards and vouchers
• Downloads: statutory rights and remedies for the first time for consumers who download or stream games, music, videos, apps and other digital content
• Services: strengthened rights for consumers purchasing services, including a right for the first time to have a substandard service remedied or refunded
• Goods: in respect of goods, a standard 30 day period in which consumers could return faulty goods and get a full refund in place of the current unclear and uncertain rules on this time period
• Gifts: consumers who acquire goods as gifts to have the same rights as the purchasers of the goods
• Unfair terms: the rules on unfair contract terms to apply to negotiated as well as standard form contract terms and an expanded list of contract terms presumed to be unfair
• Information rights: new information rights for consumers in transactions for healthcare, social services and gambling, including price information for GP and other medical consultations

Making the announcement, Jobs Minister Richard Bruton said: "The changes we are proposing today are aimed at doing two things."

"Firstly to improve consumer rights in purchasing online goods and services, which obviously accounts for an increasing proportion of consumer transactions. And secondly to clear up the anomalies and gaps in consumer rights that have grown up through years of overlapping legislation at primary, secondary and European level."

"The existing law has too many rules in some areas and too few or none at all in other areas," he added.

Minister Bruton spoke to Newstalk Lunchtime today about the proposed new laws:

Michael Kilcoyne of the Consumer Association says it's welcome news: