Everything that is surrounding the preliminary and parliamentary processing of the bill to reform the Bankruptcy Law is anomalous and unique.
Since its inception, with a public participation process surprisingly opened in August 2021, and with a subsequent development of regulations in which urgency is presiding over a debate that should be serious and rigorous, we have all witnessed the birth of a profound legal review which, far from what is desirable, has not been accompanied by the serenity and reflection required by all legal regulations and especially those that have a significant impact on the macroeconomy.
In the corridors of Congress, after the commission sessions, there are more who cross themselves than those who breathe a sigh of relief. Never has a legislative text -and the speed of its preparation- raised so many doubts, in so many sectors, and with so many conflicting opinions.
Bankruptcy law flips a coin. Your result? We’ll see after the summer.
As has been constant in the regulatory policy of this Government, the enactment of regulations with the force of law has not been accompanied by the mandatory organizational coupling. We have continuously witnessed the low cost policy of the head of the Council of Ministers and then of the official gazette, ignoring the fact that laws are not imaginary entities of applicability in the existential vacuum, but rather, as is evident, they require legal operators, media and people, or greatly simplifying, and in this case, of judges and courts.
And with the reform of the Bankruptcy Law, which will put an end to the bankruptcy moratorium declared since the first days of the COVID-19 pandemic, it will happen as with so many other equivalent laws and regulations: that we will not see more judges, and neither will more courts. That after the (false) perception of the duties done with the European Union and the final approval of the text in the Congress of Deputies, some will imagine that the whole problem is solved, that companies will be able to go to the contest easily and with the vocation of its refinancing or liquidation and that the judicial bodies will promptly manage these claims. Nothing is further from reality.
The absolute absence of an accompaniment with reinforcement measures after the approval of the bankruptcy reform will lead the Commercial Courts to a precipice from which it will be very difficult (probably impossible) to get out alive. It is reasonable for everyone that the moratorium cannot be a “new normal” in the business field, but it should be equally so that in extraordinary circumstances extraordinary means are required, especially when the new legislation does not simplify the procedures, but rather elevates them to appeal inexorable. A toast to bureaucracy.
Without additional means, after a pre-normative and parliamentary process that should be exemplified as “what should never be” and with a dark and blurred economic horizon that heralds a storm, it is urgent to ask ourselves what will happen and what will be the immediate consequences of the reform called for by the Executive.
The doubts are grouped, but an answer seems possible: judicial collapse is guaranteed.
