Scotland Forum

Scotland's Beyond 2020 - The Big Economic Picture for the New Scottish Business Order

The Panel will discuss the macro-economic backdrop but looking specifically at the impact on Scotland from 2020 and the outlook for the economic environment in which the Scottish profession will be operating.  This will be an interactive session with attendees encouraged to participate in the chat room and respond to polling questions to engage with the audience's view on the impact of Covid-19 and how the profession will respond.

Speakers

Tim Cooper, Chair, Scotland Forum and Partner, Addleshaw Goddard LLP
Jamie Lindsay, Managing Director, Breadalbane Finance
Mairi Spowage, Fraser of Allander Institute
Will Dowson, Bank of England

Leading from the Front: R3 and R3 Scotland - What Does the New Business Order Mean for Us?

The R3 Leaders will reflect on the Scottish economic context and Forum theme, the impact, challenges and opportunities for the profession in Scotland.  It will be a lively panel Q&A debate to include recent developments such as the likely use of restructuring tools, including CVAs, moratorium, and restructuring plans in the New Business Order. Forum delegates will be encouraged to participate in the chat room for Q&A or direct questions.

Speakers

R3 CEO & R3 President
Iain Fraser, R3 Scottish Technical Committee Chair
Tim Cooper, Chair, Scotland Forum and Chair, R3 Scotland Committee
Stuart McBride, Communications Manager, Policy and Public Affairs, R3
Pamela Muir, WOSIF Chair
Kirsty Low, R3 Scotland NextGen Chair

Investing in Scotland's Business Future

As we look to the ‘next normal’, what is the outlook for Scottish businesses? This Panel Q&A will bring insight and perspective from leaders in Scottish Government, Scottish Industry, the Scottish Economy and HMRC. The session will explore the role of Scottish lenders into businesses, discuss how Recovery Loan Schemes might be utilised by businesses going forward and what challenges and opportunities Scotland will face as we move through 2021, steering ourselves out of the Covid-19 pandemic and into the New Business Order. The session will discuss current business and sector confidence and highlight the stress points now and in the medium to long term. It will also discuss how Scottish Government and HMRC will support Scottish businesses as we move to the ‘next normal’. It will be an informative and engaging session, not to be missed.

Speakers

Alison Munro, Head of Business Services and Advice, Scottish Enterprise
Jamie Lindsay, Managing Director, Breadalbane Finance
Jim Morrison, Revenue Scotland
Denise Kerins, Head of Business Response Unit, Scottish Enterprise 
James Black, Fraser of Allander Institute
Ivan McKee, Minister for Business, Trade, Tourism and Enterprise

Social Event: BYOB and hear from Emma Bache

We are really looking forward to hearing from Emma Bache, one of the UK’s leading graphologists (handwriting experts) who has been analysing different types of handwriting since 1989, with a huge client list from members of the aristocracy to celebrities and business leaders.

Emma’s skills allow her to deliver some fascinating insights into human behaviour. As well as helping with recruitment and corporate restructuring, Emma has even helped to solve cases of fraud for both private individuals and the corporate world!

Join us for this interactive session as Emma discusses some fascinating insights into the handwriting styles of some famous figures and then will analyse some different handwriting examples, including some from the R3 Scotland Committee! There will also be some time for a Q&A at the end of the session.  Bring your own drinks and join us for some light-hearted fun!

Fraud – What Are We Going To Do About It?

We have all heard the news about fraudulent access to government support schemes, this session will look at the work being done by the special unit set up by HMRC to combat furlough fraud and what we can all look out for as we start to deal with an increase in advisory work and formal insolvencies as well as finding out what we as a profession can do to help HMRC recoup public funds deemed to have been mis-used.  We will hear from the Chair of the R3 Fraud Group on the steps being taken by R3 to work with all agencies and stakeholders coming up against fraud and provide some top tips on how to deal with it properly and effectively.  Insolvency professionals will all need to be wary of inadvertently falling foul of the regulations simply by utilising funds held in the company to meet fees and expenses that are later found to be proceeds of crime due to fraudulent claims for government support, not a situation anyone of us wants to be in. The session will be interactive with questions asked of the audience as well as the opportunity to put your own questions to our expert panel and hear first class advice from those working against fraud on a daily basis.

Speakers

Ian Campbell, HMRC
Chair: Frances Coulson, Senior & Managing Partner, Moon Beever and Chair, R3 Fraud Group

Time to Choose: Oil Services at a Strategic Crossroads

2020 was a tumultuous year for the oil services sector.  Once more the industry has had to deal with a brutal downturn, as it tackled the with challenges of an oil supply and demand shock whilst dealing with the operational adversity posed by a global pandemic.  For the oil & gas industry, this downturn followed in the wake of the 2014 oil price crash, which many oil services companies had yet to fully recover from.  In this session we look at how oil field services businesses are trying to adapt to ‘build back better’ in the face of an energy transition towards a lower carbon future and the impact that may have on restructuring in the sector.

Speakers

Jason Higgs, Partner, PwC
Alan Barr, Head of Energy Services, PwC
Roddy McKellar, Senior Manager, PwC
Co Chairs: Richard Bathgate, Partner, Johnston Carmichael & Rebecca Walker, Senior Associate, Ledingham Chalmers LLP

Scottish Sector Focus: Hospitality & Leisure

Scotland has a route map out of lockdown but what will that look like for the Scottish hospitality and leisure sector after a year of dormancy and how will consumers respond? By necessity our habits have changed over the last year and the sector will need to respond to this. It is anticipated that as restrictions ease some businesses in this sector will need restructuring advice, whilst others will thrive like never before.

This will be a live panel presentation, drawing in sector experts, with an audience Q&A and some online polling. Some of the topics our panel of experts will be asked to consider are:

• How will the recovery differ for city vs coast and country properties?
• Positioning Scotland as a ‘safe choice’ for inbound visitors
• How new travel and work trends will impact tourism?
• The ‘domestic opportunity index’ – the chance to convert typical outbound travellers into domestic and provide UK hotels an opportunity to grow their domestic market share.

This looks set to be a very engaging and informative session.

Speakers

Steven Fyfe, Savills
Mike Glancy, Bar and Restaurant Solutions
Chair: Jude Howson, French Duncan
Jamie Nellany, Brodies
Stephen Montgomery, Scottish Hospitality Group

Annual West of Scotland Insolvency Forum (WOSIF) Quiz

Interrogate the Institute: All you wanted to know but were afraid to ask an RPB

A unique opportunity to put anonymous questions to both the Scottish and English Institutes – what have you, the Scottish restructuring community always wanted to ask the Institute but have been too shy or afraid of the ramifications? Claire Middlebrook will host a Q&A session with David Menzies (ICAS) and David Bond (ICAEW) in a no holds barred interview.  Which Institute has the best rating for insolvency reports?  Has ICAS decided to operate fully remotely?  How does a monitoring rota really work?  Have your questions answered and watch at your leisure.

Speakers

David Bond, Director, ICAEW
David Menzies, Chartered Accountant, ICAS
Chair:  Claire Middlebrook,, Managing Director, Middlebrooks Business Recovery & Advice

Beyond Wrongful Trading: Claims Against Directors

The panel will discuss directors’ duties in light of the suspension of liability for wrongful trading under the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020, the implications in practice, and the remedies that remain available against directors. There will be a particular focus on how the landscape for claims of this nature might look as Scotland emerges out of the pandemic and goes 'back to business', as well as how the continuing expansion of opportunities for litigation funding might impact on such claims.

Speakers

Colin Maclver, Managing Associate,  Addleshaw Goddard
Neale Tosh, Advocate, Axiom Advocates
Lynsey Walker, Partner, Addleshaw Goddard