Extra Extra Read All About It. It was a cataclysmic weekend in college football for the Big 12 conference. The college football playoff committee elevated the one-loss Ohio State Buckeyes (Big 10) into the fourth and final slot in the inaugural College Football Playoff, taming a one-loss Baylor Bears (Big 12) sloth and a one-loss TCU Horned Frogs (Big 12) colony in the process. Some naysayers may look to the Big 12′s soft schedules and the absence of a league tiebreaker game as drivers of the committee’s decision.

If you’re a secured lender, news of a Chapter 11 filing by your borrower can be unsettling. The commencement of a Chapter 11 case triggers an “automatic stay” which, with certain exceptions, operates as an injunction against all actions affecting the debtor or its property.3 Under the automatic stay, a secured lender holding a security interest in the debtor’s property may not repossess or foreclose on that property without the permission of the bankruptcy court.

Background

The ongoing saga of the Scottish Coal Company liquidation provides the background to East Ayrshire Council v Zurich Insurance [2014] CSOH 102.

East Ayrshire Council (EAC) granted planning permission for a surface mine at Dalfad subject to restoration obligations on Scottish Coal. These obligations were secured by a restoration bond granted by Zurich Insurance.  Following Scottish Coal's liquidation, it and its liquidators, were unable to carry out the restoration work.

The inclusion of pre-bankruptcy waivers in “standard issue” credit documents has generated a host of litigation in bankruptcy cases about the enforceability of such provisions.

The Bankruptcy and Debt Advice (Scotland) Bill was passed by the Scottish Parliament on 20 March 2014, containing significant amendments to Scottish personal bankruptcy legislation.

Modernising Personal Bankruptcy

In our e-updates of 20 January 2010 and 16 August 2010, we looked at decisions of the English and Scottish courts from December 2009 and August 2010 in which it was decided that, in England and Scotland respectively, the Administrators of a tenant company are bound to account to the landlord of premises for rent due in relation to the period during which those premises are being u

Our government has a longstanding commitment to cutting red tape. One of the ways of doing this it seems is to propose an Act of Parliament running to 153 pages. Thus we are presented with the Deregulation Bill.

A few of the provisions of this Bill relate to insolvency. The most significant are:

Project Bank Accounts (PBA) are a payment mechanism based on ring-fenced bank accounts created to increase the security of contractors and sub-contractors in a building project. Their main benefits include security and speed of payment and protection of funds in potential insolvency. Sounds too good to be true? PBAs are becoming increasingly common, and with the Government commitment to use PBAs “unless there are compelling reasons not to do so”, their joint value in public sector contracts is expected to reach £4bn by this year.

Appeal Judges in the Court of Session yesterday issued a decision directing that the liquidators of Scottish Coal Company (SCC) cannot abandon sites or disclaim statutory licences imposing obligations on the company.

In a closely-watched case, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit recently affirmed the decision of the Delaware District Court, holding that bankruptcy claims are subject to disallowance under section 502(d) of the Bankruptcy Code despite their subsequent sale to a third-party. In In re KB Toys, Inc., No. 13-1197 (3d Cir. Nov.