PPP update: August 2022

12 September 2022

In the final summer month, R3’s Press, Policy and Public Affairs team were busy preparing for a number of upcoming legislative changes, Bills and a new fraud paper – all of which are due in the coming weeks and months.

Consulting on personal insolvency framework proposals  

In July, the Insolvency Service published its call for evidence on the personal insolvency framework and in preparation for submitting our consultation response, we have been meeting with our policy committees to discuss the proposals and garner feedback from members of the profession.

To build on this, last month the PPP team put final touches to a member survey which we issued last week to understand more about the personal insolvency framework and potential areas of improvement.

Responses to the surveys will shape our response to the Government’s consultation, and we urge all our members to take the opportunity to have their say.

Engaging with parliamentarians and stakeholders

Although Parliament was in recess over the summer, R3’s Public Affairs activity continued, with a range of meetings with parliamentarians and stakeholders to discuss key issues.

In our meetings with parliamentarians, the most of common of these was our recommendations for the reform of Companies House ahead of the publication of the second Economic Crime Bill later this year.

These discussions have helped inform a new R3 policy paper due to be published next month, which highlights the important role that the insolvency profession plays in tackling fraud and sets out our key recommendations for strengthening the UK’s corporate governance framework.

The team also met with external charities and membership bodies to discuss a number of insolvency-related topics, which included energy insolvencies and the role that administrators play in these types of cases, and football insolvencies and potential future developments in this area.

R3 in the news

In August, R3 CEO Caroline Sumner was quoted in a number of stories in ICAEW Insights, including her views on the future of insolvency regulation, and her thoughts on spotting the signs of financial distress for an advice article aimed at company directors.

Our comments on the quarterly and monthly insolvency statistics generated a range of coverage throughout August, with Christina Fitzgerald’s thoughts on the Q2 statistics for England and Wales quoted in the FT, Bloomberg, the Independent, City AM, the Guardian, Daily Express and the Sun.

Towards the end of the month, our comments on the July insolvency statistics also featured in the national media, picking up coverage in the Daily Mirror, the Daily Express, the Telegraph and the Times. Our comments also featured in a number of trade publications including Law360, Accounting Web and Credit Connect, as well as in regional titles such as Southern Daily Echo and the Lancashire Post,  to name a few.

Regional media interest in local business trends also remained high last month – including a story on a rise in late payments in the Midlands and Eastern regions where R3 was quoted in articles including the East Anglian Daily Times, while our comments on a drop in the number of new business start-ups in Yorkshire featured in articles in the Yorkshire Post, the Yorkshire Times and Yorkshire Business Woman.