It blends together a description of complex legislation, inconsistent case law, regulation, and information available both in legal articles and on the web in an encyclopaedic and rigorous fashion." Pensions, 2010
"For practitioners the book is ideal; it is clear, well balanced, beautifully constructed and easy to read. It makes no pretence to be anything but a black-letter law book; that is not a criticism and it performs its objectives admirably." Pensions, 2010
This book provides an in-depth analysis of the law relating to corporate insolvency where it interacts with the law governing employment and pension rights. It explains the detailed elements of this specialist field of law and practice, providing a useful base on which to answer questions that are likely to arise. The book offers an overview of the law of employment, pensions and corporate insolvency. It also focuses on the application of rules relating to corporate insolvency and how they affect employees and their pension rights, drawing together legislation, case law, analysis and comment.
New edition will be updated to include coverage of:
- cases on administration expenses
- new powers of the Pensions Regulator
- new review of connected or associated test
- liability of insolvency practitioners for discrimination
- cases on protective awards
- changes to employer debt provisions on pensions
- cases on directors or majority shareholders as employees
Reviews:
David Pollard is the male equivalent of the heroine in Allison Pearson’s I don’t know how she does it, the non-rom-com published in 2003. This is an astonishing book, incidentally demonstrating how publishing has changed over the last 15 years; it was published first by Tolley, then by Butterworths, then by Tottel and now by Bloomsbury – but by an unchanged publishing team regardless of the logo on the spine.
The preface reprises that of a thousand such similar works; it castigates the length and complexity of modern legislation but the difference is that, unusually and very sensibly, it attempts to draw together three separate areas of legal specialisms – pensions, employment and insolvency, each of them separately a byword for complexity. In practice, giving joined-up advice to insolvency practitioners and others in this horribly complex area is not easy, but David Pollard ’ s book is a genuine and successful attempt to enable practitioners to write a decent letter of help. Since the previous edition, barely 2 years previously, there have been material changes in administration expenses, in tPR powers, in protective awards, in TUPE, and the employer debt provisions and a host of other matters (and shortly in equal treatment, which will inevitably drive a fifth edition).
There are over 40 chapters, covering virtually stand-alone topics ranging from the personal liability of insolvency practitioners to the impact of insolvency proceedings on employees to the EU insolvency directive. It looks discretely at claims against the national Insurance Fund, a
somewhat underreported issue, issues of set-off, what happens if the business is carried on, several chapters on TUPE and other employment contract issues, and of course the role of the Pension Protection Fund. Most helpfully, it deals in detail with one of the most intractable problems for advisers and clients, namely the impact of the debt on the employer law and regulations; it is so extensive that it demands three chapters on its own. Originally, it deals with pre-packs, those much praised and criticised responses to insolvency at which creditors wince, and entrepreneurs find is a happy way to fight again.
For practitioners the book is ideal; it is clear, well balanced, beautifully constructed and easy to read. It makes no pretence to be anything but a black-letter law book; that is not a criticism and it performs its objectives admirably.
Are there any minor whinges? Inevitably, there are perhaps two main niggles. First is the reluctance to make a subjective comment (other than in the preface) on the state of the law or practice, particularly in relation to those areas of regulation in which discretion is exercised by the authorities. The complexity of s75 obligations, especially in relation to multi-employer schemes, which have been added to by attempts to reform the position, makes day-to-day management of pension funds unnecessarily expensive and difficult. Where there are ambiguities or awkward areas of law, David Pollard is reluctant to offer anything but bland advice, and is deeply reluctant to offer opinions of his own. In future editions, he should not be so reserved; he knows his material probably better than anyone, he has good judgement and he has status as one of the partners in a leading City law firm. We would all benefit from his personal opinions on how the courts might, or should, treat lacunae or ambiguities, and he is uniquely placed to offer such opinions, certainly better placed than some of the counsel involved in pensions work.
