On 28 March 2022 the Insolvency Service announced that the remaining temporary insolvency measures applied under the Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020 (CIGA 2020) will expire on 31 March 2022. This means, among other things, that it will no longer be necessary to serve a Schedule 10 notice on a debtor 21 days before issuing a winding-up petition (or to obtain court dispensation). The minimum petition amount of £10,000 will also end and petitions can again be based on a statutory demand relating to a debt of at least £750.

Practitioners will note that other restrictions on winding-up and bankruptcy petitions concerning COVID-related arrears of commercial rent continue to apply under the Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Act 2022 (see Practice note, COVID-19: Commercial Rent (Coronavirus) Act 2022: rent arbitration and the implications for enforcement).

By way of background to the expiring temporary measures under CIGA 2020, at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the government introduced a number of temporary measures to assist businesses. These included the restrictions in Schedule 10 to CIGA 2020 on issuing winding-up petitions.

On 9 September 2021, the government announced that the restrictions under CIGA 2020 that were to expire on 30 September 2021 would not be extended, but would be replaced with more limited restrictions for winding-up petitions presented between 1 October 2021 and 31 March 2022. (See Legal update, COVID-19: Government announces that the current restrictions on winding up petitions that expire on 30 September 2021 will be replaced with more limited restrictions until 31 March 2022.)

For a history of the various temporary measures that were introduced in response to the pandemic and their status, see Toolkit, Corporate Insolvency and Governance Act 2020: Status of temporary business protection measures under CIGA 2020.

We will be updating our materials to reflect the end of these temporary measures.

Source: Insolvency Service, April 2022: temporary insolvency measures are ending (28 March 2022).