Background
In a recent High Court decision, it was ruled that the liquidator not only failed in his application before the court, but in bringing forward an application that was 'doomed to fail', the liquidator was acting negligently and breached his duty of care to the company as liquidator. As a result, the liquidator was held personally liable for the costs of the application.
The Irish High Court has delivered its judgment on repudiation of contracts (including leases and guarantees) in the Norwegian case which will be of interest to the aviation and restructuring and insolvency communities alike.
The key takeaways from the judgment (which will be dealt with in more detail in a future article) are:
Examinership is a well-established corporate rescue mechanism for ailing corporates and groups. It combines flexibility with a high degree of commercial and procedural certainty for all involved. It is a process which has evolved with the different economic cycles in Ireland since its inception in 1990 and has responded to downturns in different sectors.
Mr. O’Neill held a Buy-Out-Bond (BOB) with a pension provider. The retirement options were standard for such a product; allowing for the purchase of annuity, or investment in an Approved Retirement Fund (ARF) or Approved (Minimum) Retirement Fund (AMRF) as well as providing for taxable and non-taxable lump sum entitlements. Mr. O’Neill denied any entitlement of his official assignee (OA) in bankruptcy in exercising the retirement options provided by his pension where a Bankruptcy Payment Order (BPO) pursuant to s85 of the Bankruptcy Act 1988 (Act) had not been obtained.
As published in the Business Post, March 14th.
Corporate partners Eoin Brereton and Bernard McEvoy discuss their experience in advising clients though crises including the ongoing pandemic in yesterday’s Business Post report on corporate restructuring and rebuilding corporate performance.
Now that the UK has left the EU and the transition period ended on 31 December 2020, this briefing considers the key points of the legal and regulatory landscape from the perspective of Ireland.
Deal or no-deal?
In effect, there is both. The December 2020 EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement1 (the “TCA”) includes a ‘deal’ so far as concerns EU-UK trade in many types of good. However, the TCA makes little provision for trade in services and so, broadly, it is ‘no-deal’ as regards most types of service.
The Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment commenced a public consultation process on 8 February 2021, in relation to proposed legislation which will allow for a new restructuring procedure for the rescue of small companies.
There are plans to establish a new corporate rescue procedure for small companies. Currently termed the Summary Rescue Procedure, it was initially proposed by the Company Law Review Group in October 2020.
The Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment (Department) is now seeking submissions from stakeholders to inform the development of this new restructuring procedure.
Why the need for a new corporate rescue procedure?
On Monday, 7 December, the Irish High Court affirmed the appointment of an examiner, Kieran Wallace of KPMG, to a number of companies in the Norwegian Air Group (“Norwegian”) as well as the Oslo based parent company of the group, Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA (“NAS”). The appointment of the examiner will provide Norwegian with critical protection from its creditors for a period of approximately 100 days. This article briefly outlines some aspects of the examinership process and what it entails for Norwegian’s creditors.
The High Court has recently brought welcome clarity to how pensions are dealt with in the event of a bankruptcy, in the case of Lehane –v- Wealth Options and Brian O'Neill.