Unfair preference meaning

In this issue: The King’s Speech 2024 Key developments Status and worker categories Equality, diversity and inclusion Redundancy Unfair dismissal Employment Tribunals Financial services and banking: employment issues Immigration Daily and weekly news alerts New and updated content IRLR Highlights—August 2024 Dates for your diary Trackers New Q&As The King’s Speech 2024 King’s Speech 2024—Employment His Majesty, King Charles III, outlined the government’s agenda and planned measures for the forthcoming parliamentary term during the State Opening of Parliament on 17 July 2024. The 2024 King’s Speech concentrates on raising the living standards of working people via economic expansion and on ‘taking the brakes off Britain’. A headline employment proposal is the Employment Rights Bill, reflecting the government’s pledge to implement its ‘Plan to Make Work Pay: Delivering a New Deal for Working People’. Legislation is to follow to prohibit zero-hour contracts, stop fire and rehire practices, and confer...

A guarantee operates as a species of quasi-security (see Practice Note: Guarantees). Within commercial finance, guarantees frequently serve as a standard form of credit support in lending transactions and wider arrangements. For instance, where a company is the borrower, the lender may seek guarantees from its directors. More rarely, and typically at the smaller end of the commercial finance market, the lender may ask a closely related family member of a director—such as a spouse, civil partner, or parent—to act as guarantor for the borrower. When obtaining an individual’s guarantee, a number of additional matters arise beyond those encountered in the general law of guarantees. This Practice Note sets out the principal issues to address when taking an individual guarantee in a commercial financing context, namely: the capacity of individuals to grant guarantees undue influence voidable transactions moratoriums under the debt respite scheme, and the potential applicability of consumer related rules, regulations and legislation The discussion focuses on the following...

Company voluntary arrangements (CVAs) are regularly employed by companies to deliver a restructuring (see: Company voluntary arrangements—overview) and have been used to compromise landlord liabilities (see News Analysis: A hat trick of leading decisions on creditor cramdowns—treatment of landlord groups in New Look, Regis and Virgin Atlantic). The Insolvency Service’s July 2024 statistics reported that CVAs were 64% higher in June 2024 than in June 2023, though volumes still sat below historic levels. This may reflect the rising preference for Part 26A restructuring plans to compromise landlord liabilities (see News Analysis: Market Insights Trend Report—trends in Part 26A restructuring plans in 2024 and Practice Note: Part 26A restructuring plan—key cases). Case tracker Key CVA cases since January 2021 include (most recent first): Robinson Webster (Holdings) Limited — 30 January 2026 — Lord Justice Holgate and Mr Justice Mould — A CVA cannot unilaterally divest a tenant of its proprietary right to possession; applying Lazari Properties 2 Limited v New Look Retailers [2021] EWHC 1209 (Ch),...

Sections 242 and 243 of the Insolvency Act 1986 (IA 1986) In Scotland, these provisions regulate the two principal forms of antecedent transaction that a company may undertake. They do not apply to individuals or to companies registered in England and Wales; for the position in England, refer to the Practice Notes on transactions at an undervalue under section 238 and on preferences under section 239 of the Insolvency Act 1986. For Scottish individual/personal debtors, consult the Practice Note on gratuitous alienations by individual debtors. For a glossary of frequently used Scottish insolvency terminology, see Practice Note: Glossary of Scottish insolvency words and expressions. Unfair preferences What constitutes an unfair preference? An unfair preference is any transaction entered into by a company, whether before or after 1 April 1986, that has the effect of giving one creditor priority over the general body of creditors (IA 1986, s 243(1)). The date on which the unfair preference arises is the date the transaction became effectual. Hardening periods...