Overview
The legislative file 2022/0408(COD) concerns a proposal for a Directive harmonising certain aspects of insolvency law. The procedure is ongoing, with the European Parliament having adopted its first-reading position. The analysis is based on the European Parliament's legislative resolution (P10_TA(2026)0057) adopted on 10 March 2026, which details the Parliament's amendments to the Commission's proposal. The report overview indicates that the Parliament's committee report represents a substantial revision, with only 26 of 200 articles from the Commission's original text retained unchanged, while 174 articles reflect modifications by the European Parliament.
Legislative timeline
The procedural history began with the referral to the European Parliament's committee on 26 January 2023. Key committee milestones include an opinion tabled on 25 July 2023, the adoption of a committee opinion on 19 March 2025, and the tabling and subsequent adoption of the committee report in March and June 2025, respectively. The file was tabled for a plenary session on 1 July 2025, with the Parliament endorsing the opening of interinstitutional negotiations on 9 July 2025. Further negotiation rounds occurred on 19 November and 11 December 2025. A recent indicative plenary sitting date was noted for 9 March 2026. An upcoming event is scheduled at the Council level: a Jurists/Linguists Group meeting on 2 October 2026 to finalise the text of the Insolvency Law Directive.
Institutional handling
The lead committee in the European Parliament is the Committee on Legal Affairs. The Committees on Economic and Monetary Affairs and on Internal Market and Consumer Protection provided opinions. Within the European Commission, the Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers (JUST) is responsible, under Commissioner Didier Reynders. In the Council of the European Union, the relevant configuration is the Justice and Home Affairs Council (JHA).
Stakeholder reactions
There has been notable stakeholder engagement with Members of the European Parliament, with 16 documented meetings involving 12 distinct organisations. No meetings with Commissioners or Commission staff were recorded in this dataset. The most active organisations in these engagements were the European Banking Federation, the Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund, NautaDutilh, the European Association of Paritarian Institutions of Social Protection, and the Conseil national des administrateurs judiciaires et des mandataires judiciaires.
Key provisions and EP changes
The European Parliament's legislative resolution establishes a framework for minimum harmonisation across several targeted insolvency areas to reduce cross-border legal fragmentation. Key policy provisions cover avoidance actions, tracing of assets, pre-pack proceedings, directors' duties, creditors' committees, and standardised information factsheets. The Parliament introduced significant modifications. Firstly, it added a new Article 3b on the protection of workers, clarifying that the Directive is without prejudice to existing Union and national labour law, specifically listing directives on collective redundancies, transfers of undertakings, and employee involvement. This ensures harmonisation does not lower existing worker protection standards, particularly concerning pre-pack proceedings. Secondly, regarding the definition of related parties for natural person debtors, the Parliament significantly expanded the Commission's text by adding a comprehensive list that includes family members, household members, and employees with access to non-public information. This broadens the scope of transactions subject to scrutiny. Thirdly, on access to bank account information for asset tracing, the Parliament made substantial modifications to the Commission's text, which originally referred to access by courts. The adopted text grants designated courts or authorities direct and immediate access to national bank account registers and cross-border access via the Bank Account Registers Interconnection System (BARIS) for necessary case information, under strict data-security obligations. It also ensures insolvency practitioners have timely access to beneficial ownership data and direct access to various national asset registers listed in an Annex.