Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they intend to commission a review of the use of Company Voluntary Arrangements (CVAs), in particular to consider whether CVAs are used in good faith by landlords who have weakened the lessor covenant through previous payments of high dividends or capital distributions.

Company Voluntary Arrangements (CVAs) are a valuable part of the restructuring framework and there are no plans to review their use at this time. The Government consulted on a wide-ranging package of reforms to corporate insolvency in 2018, to enhance rescue prospects and also to address poor corporate behaviour. Following this consultation, Government announced it will strengthen the powers available to insolvency practitioners to take recovery action where value has been extracted from a company prior to its insolvency, thereby increasing the protections already available to creditors. These proposals will be introduced when parliamentary time permits.