Deregistered/dissolved companies – let them be?
The UK Insolvency Service has been granted new investigative and disqualification powers to regulate directors who ‘dissolve’ (in Australian terms, ‘deregister’) their companies to avoid paying their liabilities. This is under the Rating (Coronavirus) and Directors Disqualification (Dissolved Companies) Act 2021. If misconduct is found, directors can face serious sanctions, including court orders for compensation.[1] […]
Insolvent insolvency practitioners?
An Australian insolvency industry body – ARITA – has suggested that the law should be changed to allow insolvency practitioners (IPs) who themselves become insolvent, or their company, to nevertheless be permitted to remain registered to practice: Members facing financial distress, December 2021, version 1.0. This is in the context of advice given by ARITA […]
UK’s proposed single insolvency regulator – beware Australian comparisons [revised]
After some long period of deliberation, the UK government has decided to itself take a direct role in the regulation of its insolvency practitioners (IPs), which it likens to Australia’s approach, as one example, but, unlike Australia, the UK also proposes to regulate insolvency firms. The UK is therefore to do away with its current […]
Is it relevant outside Canberra whether a law is within or without Treasury’s portfolio?
With the government’s Treasury department busily introducing changes to the law to allow virtual meeting technology (VMT) for corporate liquidations, and liquidator job interviews, the latest being about polls and voting, it does not seem to be ensuring the same changes are made in personal bankruptcy law, although it is reverting to the “show of […]
Australian bankruptcy statistics 2019-2021
Numbers of Australia’s 3 year long bankruptcies were down 46.7% in 2020-2021, producing an average dividend of only 1.63c/$. The private profession, which handles about 20% of bankruptcies, paid out 2.37c/$. Their total remuneration of $69m came from total receipts of $274m. These figures come from AFSA’s annual administration statistics for the 2020-2021 and also […]
Australian MSME insolvency law reform
Australian lawyers are presently represented at an international gathering of experts to address the need for particular insolvency laws for small business in the wake of COVID-19, given the unique issues of financial distress involved in that sector: Working Group V: Insolvency Law | United Nations Commission On International Trade Law 13-17 December 2021. On […]
Unconscionable and immoral corporate conduct – nothing personal
In imposing a $153 million penalty on a company already in liquidation, for its “deliberate and protracted unconscionable conduct of a highly predatory nature“, a Judge expressed particular regret that the company’s former CEO, “Mr Amjad Khanche [is] not able to be made the subject of any liability or other adverse findings against him in […]
Any insolvency remuneration review as sought by ASIC “would be unprincipled and ultimately, wholly pointless”
From the opening paragraphs, one can foresee the outcome of this decision, about ASIC’s “unprincipled and pointless” intervention to deny voluntary administrators of GD Pork their remuneration because of some claimed lack of independence: [2021] WASC 428. Jones and Smith had been appointed as the joint voluntary administrators of two related corporations in October 2018 […]
Do our insolvency laws suit small business failures?
In shopping for a suit recently, I noticed that the Big Store displayed its suits according to brand, which apparently suited the Store, or its supplier, but not the customer, or this customer. Hence, I went elsewhere. Insolvency service providers are like the Big Store in that they look at a customer – a business […]
High level of business bankruptcies in construction and retail
Latest figures show that nearly 60% of personal bankruptcies in the construction industry were involved in a business, with those in retail businesses comprising around 50% in their sector. Business bankruptcies totalled around 40% of all bankruptcies. Fortnightly bankruptcy and personal insolvency statistics | Australian Financial Security Authority (afsa.gov.au) Small business Persons operating their own businesses […]