The Scottish Law Commission has put forward proposals to clean up Scottish bankruptcy laws.
A paper on consolidating existing bankruptcy legislation has published a consultation, it said the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 1985 had “lost coherence” after being heavily amended in recent years.
It added the proposals were intended to “remove anomalies, treat like cases in the same way or to omit provisions that no longer serve any purpose”.
But the commission said the legislation had since been heavily amended, most notably by the Bankruptcy and Diligence etc. (Scotland) Act 2007.
“Many of the provisions of the 1985 act are excessively long and the structure of the act has become difficult to follow with the result that the act has lost coherence.”
The commission said it was also inviting suggestions for other amendments which would “seek to tidy up (as opposed to reform) the 1985 act”.
Commission chairman Lord Drummond Young, said: “It is essential that the law in important areas such as bankruptcy should be stated in a clear and accessible form.
He went on to to say “The existing statutory provisions dealing with bankruptcy are lengthy, are cumbersome and difficult to use.
“Our aim is to remedy this by restating the law in a single coherent act. This will, we think, be of great assistance to all those who become involved in bankruptcy procedures.”
The commission has prepared a draft of a Bankruptcy (Scotland) Bill to consolidate the legislation and an order which would give effect to some provisions of the bill in other parts of the UK.
Source BBC News