Vizcaya Partners Limited v Picard and another [2016] UKPC 5

Privy Council advice that addresses what is required for foreign judgements

Until now the 1981 English case of The Halcyon Isle has been the principle authority on maritime liens and conflict of laws in Anglo-Common law jurisdictions. In that case, which was on appeal from the Singapore courts, the majority of the Privy Council held that the recognition and enforcement of maritime liens were to be determined according to the law of the forum in which the proceedings were commenced (i.e. the lex fori).

Europe has struggled mightily during the last several years to triage a long series of critical blows to the economies of the 27 countries that comprise the European Union, as well as the collective viability of eurozone economies. Here we provide a snapshot of some recent developments relating to insolvency and restructuring in the EU.

A report has been published on whether the harmonisation of the insolvency laws of EU Member States is necessary or worthwhile. The European Parliament commissioned the report, and it was produced and published by INSOL Europe, the professional association for European restructuring and insolvency specialists.

The report considers:

Introduction

Recent decisions from the courts have raised the legal risk for directors and underlined the exposure to third party liability of auditors, trustees and promoters. 

As a result, we can probably expect this year to have more claims made by receivers, liquidators and out-of-pocket investors against those involved in:

A lien is the right to hold on to goods, and in some cases sell them, in order to ensure payment.  Often the debt will be connected with services related to the goods.

A lien can be obtained by contract, or in certain specific situations the law creates it automatically.  The difference can be significant.

Under the Personal Property Securities Act (PPSA), the holder of a common law or statutory lien may in some cases have special priority over a company’s secured creditors.

Types of lien

In our legal update on insolvency law issued in July 2010 we commented on the High Court decision of McKay v Toll Logistics (NZ) Limited. 

In Brief

For the first time, a court has adopted the ‘centre of main interest’ (COMI) as grounds at common law to recognise foreign insolvency proceedings.

The decision earlier this year by the High Court of Singapore (the Court) recognised a Japanese bankruptcy trustee appointed to companies incorporated in the British Virgin Islands (BVI):

In March this year, the High Court in Beluga Chartering¹ addressed a unique provision of Singapore's Companies Act that requires local liquidators to ring-fence a foreign company's assets for the settlement of the debts it incurred in Singapore before they transmit its assets to overseas liquidators and creditors. This decision exploring the implications of section 377 on Singapore's cross-border insolvency legal framework is timely considering the ongoing review of Singapore's insolvency laws.

A summary of the factual background