FINE GAEL & BANKRUPTCY LAW

Fine Gael will overhaul bankruptcy laws to establish a more flexible approach to personal and corporate debt similar to the one operating in Northern Ireland, The Sunday Business Post reports.

The policy document, Encouraging Enterprise and Entrepreneurship, would allow out-of-court debt settlement for businesses that are owed money. It would also involve a new, legally binding arrangement that would allow individual debtors and their creditors to agree on a certified insolvency professional to restructure debts.

This would protect the indebted individual from interest charges and the threat of enforcement while outstanding debts were satisfied.

Deirdre Clune, the party’s spokeswoman for innovation and research, said the current laws were impractical, costly and over-punitive and they did not meet the needs of a “business-friendly, risk-taking environment”.