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The Personal Insolvency Bill has now passed through the Dail and will commence in the Seanad. The Minister for Justice has commented that the intention is still to have the Bill enacted by Christmas.

Bill C-45 proposes changes to the Payment Clearing and Settlement Act to enhance certainty that clearing house default rules will be enforceable in the event of a clearing member default. These reforms are an important aspect of financial markets reforms

Where an insured deposit taking institution (and let’s just call it abank to make things easy) is subject to a receivership order under the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation Act (CDIC Act) the government can incorporate a bridge bank to take over the good assets and run the bank until it can be sold. If it does so the usual exemptions from the statutory stays for termination, netting and collateral enforcement for el

On September 6, 2012, the Commission des lésions professionnelles (the CLP) deliberated on the interpretation of article 316 of An Act Respecting Industrial Accidents and Occupational Diseases(the Act) which states that the Commission de la santé et de la sécurité du travail (the CSST) can require from an employer that retains the services of a contractor to pay the assessment due by said contractor.

On 4 July 2012, the Minister for Finance, Mr Michael Noonan, launched a public consultation on the tax implications of appointing a receiver. The consultation paper was jointly issued by the Department of Finance and the Revenue Commissioners and invited input by 4 September 2012 from interested parties in relation to technical and practical tax implications concerning the appointment of receivers.

The Personal Insolvency Bill 2012 has passed Committee Stage in the Dáil. The Select Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality made a number of changes to the Bill, many of these being technical changes to clarify provisions or to correct inconsistencies.

Key changes

Some of the key changes made by the Select Committee were as follows:

The Irish telecommunications company eircom recently successfully concluded its restructuring through the Irish examinership process. This examinership is both the largest in terms of the overall quantum of debt that was restructured and also the largest successful restructuring through examinership in Ireland to date. The speed with which the restructuring of this strategically important company was concluded was due in large part to the degree of pre-negotiation between the company and its lenders before the process commenced.

The much anticipated Personal Insolvency Bill has been published and introduces wide-ranging measures to seek to deal with the issue of personal debt affecting many people in the country today. The headline changes are the reduction of the period a person is bankrupt from 12 to 3 years and the introduction of three new debt resolution processes which, while being under the jurisdiction of the Courts are predominantly non judicial based processes involving the newly established Insolvency Service.

In a decision issued on April 20th, 2012, Justice Robert Mongeon of the Superior Court of Quebec gave a decisive answer to one of the most troubling questions facing debtors and DIP lenders in reorganizations under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act(CCAA).

On 30 March 2012, the European Commission published a consultation on the future of European insolvency law.

The cornerstone of European insolvency law is Regulation (EC) No 1346/2000, known as the Insolvency Regulation. The Insolvency Regulation has been in force since 31 May 2002 and applies whenever a debtor has assets or creditors in more than one member state. It sets out provisions in relation to jurisdiction, recognition, applicable law and the coordination of insolvency proceedings opened in several member states.