Top personal injury firm goes bust

Britain's biggest personal injury compensation specialist went bust today, leaving question marks hanging over tens of thousands of claims now in the pipeline.

The Accident Group, which processes more than 180,000 claims a year, is understood to have called in the administrators and is laying off 2,400 staff. The Manchester-based firm reportedly failed to pay last month's wages and is said to be millions in debt.

The Accident Group cornered a quarter of the burgeoning personal injury market in the last three years and was thought to be making profits of £17million. Husbandand-wife founders Mark and Deborah Langford were not available for comment today.

It is understood the group has been left with liabilities potentially running into hundreds of millions of pounds over loans to fund personal injury compensation claims.

In recent years, Britain's compensation culture has boomed as firms advertised "No win, no fee" legal representation. But in many cases, they charged thousands of pounds to take a claim to court, promising to return it if the claim succeeded. This practice was recently outlawed. A court ruling declared people should pay no more than £450.