Enterprise Court of Ghent, 15 December 2025: AI & procedural responsibility.

Enterprise Court of Ghent, 15 December 2025: AI & procedural responsibility.

Book XX of the Belgian Code of Economic Law forms the main legislative framework governing insolvency and restructuring proceedings in Belgium. An enterprise may request the opening of a judicial reorganisation when it can demonstrate that its continuity is under threat, or will be under threat, even where the formal conditions for bankruptcy are already met at the time of filing.

Belgian law provides for both informal and formal restructuring mechanisms, including:

• an out-of-court amicable settlement with 1 or more creditors, benefiting from protection in the event of a subsequent bankruptcy;

• a public judicial reorganisation procedure aimed at reaching (i) an amicable settlement or (ii) a debt restructuring plan; and

• a confidential judicial reorganisation procedure aimed at reaching (i) an amicable settlement or (ii) a debt restructuring plan.

In practice, applications for judicial reorganisation are often filed at a moment of significant pressure. Management might be operating in the context of financial distress and uncertainty, while the company itself might already be struggling operationally and/or economically.

Against that backdrop, AI and other technological tools can be a real added value to work more efficiently and manage procedural pressure. Hence, there is nothing inherently problematic about using such tools. AI may assist, streamline and support legal work. What it cannot do, however, is replace professional judgment. A meaningful human layer remains indispensable, at the very least for the initial legal analysis and the final review and approval of procedural submissions

That distinction lies at the heart of a striking decision of the Enterprise Court of Ghent of 15 December 2025.<br>In this case, a request to reopen the debates was filed, purportedly based on judgments of the Belgian Constitutional Court and the Court of Cassation which, as the court bluntly observes, did not exist. <br>The court qualified this conduct as an attempt to disrupt the normal course of proceedings through a manifestly unfounded procedural application.

It explicitly acknowledges a new and troubling reality: courts are increasingly forced to verify whether cited case law actually exists, and whether it is applicable to the case at stake. This burden should not be shifted onto the judiciary. As the court makes clear, such practices undermine the proper administration of justice.

The decision fits squarely within a broader judicial trend. The use of AI does not excuse inaccuracies, fabrications or a lack of verification. Parties remain fully responsible for the content of their submissions, regardless of the tools used to produce them. Reliance on fabricated or unverifiable sources may amount to sanctionable procedural misconduct.

The court was equally uncompromising in its assessment of the proposed reorganisation plan. It found no justification whatsoever to submit the plan to the creditors for a vote. According to the court: (i) the plan contained no concrete, verifiable or executable measures; (ii) did not allow for any assessment under Article XX.79 §§3–4 of the Belgian Code of Economic Law; (iii) consisted of 22 pages of empty and meaningless wording; and in the end just appeared largely to be the result of copy-paste work from business management courses, economics manuals and insolvency law textbooks.

For lawyers, in-house counsels and companies, this judgment underscores an increasingly important obligation: to remain critically engaged with the output of technological tools. Certain warning signs should trigger heightened scrutiny. For example, unusually lengthy documents, certain formulaic structures, or recurring and generic wording that lacks specificity. As always, professional judgment requires stepping back and asking the obvious but essential questions: Does this make sense? Is this accurate? Is it verifiable? Maybe equally important in this case, is adopting the perspective of the opposing party or other stakeholders. In casu: How would the proposed reorganisation plan be received by us if we would be a creditor? If the answer is uncertain, the reorganisation plan is maybe not ready to be filed.

ECLI:BE:ORBRL:2025:JUG.20250902.1