An Ontario judge has rejected a proposed Hudson’s Bay Company restructuring agreement that would have given the retailer more runway to save the six stores not being liquidated, even as its creditors are circling closer.

In his decision, Justice Peter Osborne of the Superior Court of Justice writes that the proposal is neither necessary nor appropriate.

The agreement would not only have given the embattled department store a deadline to rescue its remaining stores but imposed a budget it would have regularly had to report to lenders Bank of America, Restore Capital and Pathlight Capital.

Osborne said he was reluctant to approve the agreement in part because the budget wasn’t submitted to the court or other stakeholders to review.

He said the monitor appointed by the court to help guide Hudson’s Bay through its creditor protection proceedings is sufficient to balance the lenders’ rights with those of other stakeholders rather than the agreement put forward.

Lenders arguing in favour of the agreement saw it as a way to hold them off from filing for receivership, a process where a failing business has its assets seized so they can be sold to repay creditors.