On Monday 9 October, members of the European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) examined the amendments tabled concerning the targeted harmonisation of certain aspects of insolvency law in order to encourage cross-border investment.
For René Repasi (S&D, German), rapporteur of the opinion on this dossier, the issue of insolvency proceedings for small and medium-sized enterprises should be “examined more closely” and ‘pre-pack’ proceedings - which allow a restructuring plan to be agreed before a company declares insolvency - should “be an instrument that guarantees to save jobs”.
“If we don’t protect workers, their interests risk being neglected. We are trying to strike a balance, and the Greens/EFA Group is going down the same road as we are, so this dimension must be taken into account”, said Mr Repasi.
The EPP believes that SMEs should benefit from simplified proceedings, but that these should be subject to certain conditions. The right-wing group also believes that insolvency practitioners could be useful in proceedings involving micro-enterprises.
The Commission said it was “not opposed to the inclusion of practitioners”, but insisted that “the only values that could be recovered” in insolvency proceedings should “not only be used to pay practitioners”.
In addition, part of the discussions focused on the deadlines for launching proceedings. The EPP argues that, given the differing approaches in the Member States, excessively short deadlines would not be desirable. The European Commission, for its part, believes that longer deadlines would run the risk of “value evaporation”. “There has to be a very specific moment, otherwise there will be risks. We need very clear rules for leaders”, it replied to Danuta Hübner (EPP, German), speaking on behalf of her colleague Frances Fitzgerald (Irish). (Original version in French by Thomas Mangin)