Richard Bruton (Dublin North Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The situation is that if a company ceases trading, it has certain obligations to meet as result, in that it has to meet its Revenue obligations, its obligations to pay redundancy payments to workers and so on. If the company is unable to pay, it can apply to the Department of Social Protection to have its responsibilities to workers met from the redundancy insolvency fund. However, there is no general provision that, when a business gets into difficulty and closes down, the person cannot open up a fresh business. There is no such ban and there should not be. Companies can get into trading difficulties and are unable to continue, as has happened.

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