24 Scots firms go to the wall every week

MORE than 24 businesses a week failed last year as a record number of Scots firms went to the wall.

New figures show that 1,278 firms went into receivership or liquidation, 16.4 per cent higher than the previous year, which was itself the highest for Scots business failures since records began a decade ago. The figures do not include those firms that have gone into administration.

The data has emerged from analysis of figures from the Accountancy in Bankruptcy by accountants PKF. Bryan Jackson, corporate recovery partner at PKF, said that potential “domino” effects meant there could be more businesses “simply hanging on and about to go under at any minute”.

He said: “These figures are a further sign that the economy is not going well. Whilst most of these businesses will be fairly modest in size, the impact on the overall economy of this level of failure is likely to be great.

“The fact that the numbers are getting worse is a further sign that we are some considerable way off nearing the end of this period of economic downturn. I would expect record numbers of corporate failures to continue.”

John Hall, a council member of the insolvency professional trade body R3, predicted there will be more corporate failures this year at a “similar, if not higher, level”.

Despite these gloomy figures the Q4 figures showed a drop of 22.4 per cent on the previous quarter but an increase of 5.6 per cent on the same quarter in 2010.