Item 1 is the United Kingdom Government’s Corporate Insolvency and Governance Bill. We need to consider a legislative consent memorandum, or LCM, on the bill.
The bill contains a range of proposals to support companies that are facing financial difficulties. Some of the changes will be permanent, while some are time-limited in response to the current coronavirus crisis.
The majority of provisions in the bill relate to reserved matters. The regulation of companies is a reserved matter, as are various aspects of corporate insolvency.
However, some little areas of the bill relate to devolved matters. Several aspects of the bill engage the LCM process, but broadly speaking the impact on devolved competence is fairly minor and technical.
The committee has not heard of any concerns coming from insolvency stakeholders, so we concluded that we did not need to take evidence from anyone this morning. However, before we make a decision on approving the LCM, the deputy convener wishes to contribute to the discussion.