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The government consultation on further reforms to personal injury will not be published until after the EU referendum and will be implemented in 2017, the civil justice minister indicated today as he gave no ground on the measures to be put forward.

The founder of an unregulated law firm offering advice to SMEs has said there is a “massive space” for similar companies to move into the market. Robert Taylor, founder of Business Law Online, said small businesses wanted a “much more commercial” approach.

Crowdjustice, the legal crowdfunding platform, has launched its first funding project, as opposed to a specific case, and has already raised half of the target amount needed by a legal support charity from a corporate sponsor.

Slater & Gordon saw its share price double yesterday after its banks gave the alternative business structure breathing space to turn the business around. The firm said it considered the lenders’ agreement to change the terms of its borrowing to be “a positive and clear endorsement of the company’s performance improvement program”.

Two solicitors accused of misusing £573,000 lent to their law firm by the controversial Axiom Legal Financing Fund have been cleared by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal – in part because they relied on assurances given to them by Richard Barnett, who was subsequently struck off himself for misusing Axiom money.

More than one in five law firms have been targeted by scammers in the past year, Law Society research has revealed. Money was successfully stolen from client account in 8% of these cases. However the society’s annual indemnity survey found that average premiums paid by firms with up to 25 partners were down by 8%.

Riverview Law’s ground-breaking development of technology for use by in-house counsel and others in the law this week saw the launch of its first two ‘virtual assistants’. Powered by the alternative business structure’s ‘Kim’ technology platform, they cover instruction and triage, and general case management.

Christina Blacklaws, who shot to prominence as director of policy at Co-operative Legal Services, has been elected as the next deputy vice-president of the Law Society. This means she should become president in July 2018, only the fifth woman to hold the chain of office in what will be, by then, the society’s 193-year history.

The UK office of a major US law firm specialising in acting for men in divorce cases, is approaching its first anniversary with plans to expand into several UK cities. The Solicitors Regulation Authority initially “took an interest” in whether Cordell & Cordell discouraged women clients.

A company that provides valuation, sales and other services to dentists has added legal advice to its offering with the launch of an alternative business structure. The aim is to make FTA Law “the largest provider of legal services” to the dental profession.