I crediti di lavoro nella riforma della legge fallimentare: incertezze e opportunità

The 2006 reform of the Italian bankruptcy law basically does not bring substantive innovations about the treatment of the labourers’ credits into the bankruptcy proceeding, since it is still operating the general (and not modified) civil code rule about the hierarchy of credits. Nevertheless, new perspectives of more satisfying treatments may come through the utilisation of the alternative proceedings, the “concordato preventivo” (a preventive agreement) and the brand new “accordi di ristrutturazione dei debiti” (debts’ restructuring plans), where creditors may be split into different classes, each of whom with different expectations. Therefore, the paper analyses the main innovations of the Italian reform, focusing on the opportunities that may come to the labourers’ credits through a more flexible discipline of the negotiated solutions of the businesses crises and breakdowns.