The Official Receiver's Office administers the estates of individuals adjudged to be bankrupt by the court and also companies ordered by the court to be wound up.

    The Official Receiver becomes the receiver of an individual debtor or provisional liquidator of a company when a bankruptcy order against the property of the debtor or a winding-up order against the company is made. Where the assets of an estate do not exceed $200,000, the Official Receiver is usually appointed the trustee or the liquidator by way of a summary procedure order. In other cases, a meeting of creditors in bankruptcy, or meetings of creditors and contributories in compulsory liquidations will be convened to decide whether the Official Receiver or some other fit persons from the private sector should be appointed the trustee or liquidator.

    When he acts as the trustee or liquidator, the Official Receiver investigates the affairs of the bankrupt or the wound-up company, realises assets and distributes dividends to creditors. The Official Receiver also prosecutes certain offences set out in the Bankruptcy and Companies Ordinances, applies for disqualification orders against unfit company directors, supervises the work of outside liquidators and trustees, and monitors the funds held by liquidators in both compulsory and voluntary liquidations.

    To cope with the large increase in the workload of the Official Receiver, a tendering scheme has been established to contract out the summary winding-up cases to private sector insolvency practitioners. Under the scheme, these private sector insolvency practitioners are appointed by the Official Receiver as provisional liquidators in place of the Official Receiver and their remuneration is subsidised by government funds up to the limits submitted in their tenders.

    During the year, the court made 25 328 bankruptcy orders, 805 interim orders in individual voluntary arrangements and 1 292 winding-up orders. The assets realised by the Official Receiver during 2002 amounted to $133.7 million, while $110.7 million in dividends was paid to creditors in 1 200 insolvency cases. There were 1 228 cases assigned under the scheme for contracting out of summary winding-up cases.

    The Companies (Corporate Rescue) Bill, which was introduced into the Legislative Council in May 2001, aims to put in place a statutory corporate rescue procedure for companies in financial difficulty. The Legislative Council has set up a Bills Committee to examine the bill. In the light of the comments expressed by the Bills Committee, the Government is considering possible changes to certain provisions in the bill with a view to conducting a further round of consultation with concerned parties.