Toby Perkins – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Toby Perkins on 2014-04-25.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what estimate he has made of the proportion of (a) Official Receivers and (b) all Insolvency Service officials who will receive training leading to a (i) personal insolvency partial licence and (ii) corporate insolvency partial licence.

Jenny Willott

The legislation relating to official receivers and Insolvency Service technical staff, does not require study to hold an Insolvency Practitioners’ Licence and, as such, no staff will receive training that will lead to either a personal insolvency partial licence or a corporate insolvency partial licence.

Under S399(1) of the Insolvency Act 1986 “………the official receiver, in relation to any bankruptcy, winding up, individual voluntary arrangement, debt relief order or application for such an orderis any person who by virtue of the following provisions ………….is authorised to act as the official receiver ………..” and S399(2) “The Secretary of State may ……. appoint persons to the office of official receiver ……………….”.

All technical staff are required to study for, and pass, a bespoke accredited training programme at Qualifications & Credit Framework Level 3 and are required to undertake a minimum of 5 days Continuous Professional Development per year.

Incidentally, over 50% of Official Receivers hold a professional qualification e.g. ACCA.