The UK Government has introduced a new suspension of the wrongful trading provisions contained in s214 of the Insolvency Act 1986 (IA 1986) to apply from 26 November 2020 to 30 April 2021.

The Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act came into force on 26 June 2020 introducing a number of reforms aimed at providing protection to companies in financial distress, particularly as a result of the COVID19 pandemic.

However, the reforms present a number of potential problems to suppliers. Specifically, a permanent provision has been added to the Insolvency Act 1986 which:

Construction litigation is no stranger to insolvency, including insolvent claimants. This is also the case for adjudication, a fast and commercially driven form of dispute resolution for the construction industry. However, there has been considerable uncertainty as to the enforceability of adjudicators’ awards where a claimant is insolvent and receives a favourable decision. Recent cases have shed some light on this issue and have started to untangle the statutory difficulties when insolvency meets adjudication.