Chairing the LALYs (Legal Aid Lawyer of the Year awards) last week, the Prime Minister's wife demonstrated her support for that hard-working, hard-nosed and hard-up sector of the profession. But as Cherie Booth QC said, sometimes there is only so far she can go in her support - for the lawyers' own sake. Someone needs to sing the praises of legal aid lawyers, she said. But it should not be her. 'I would sing, but when I tried to sing "When I'm sixty-four" in China recently [when a group of students demanded a song from her and Mr Blair], it did not get the best publicity. So perhaps it's best if I don't do the singing on behalf of legal aid lawyers.' Perhaps Ms Booth is unaware of her melodic success - her karaoke rendition has become a surprise dance hit among British clubbers in Ibiza and Cyprus. Obiter would not like to speculate on how many pills those young folk must have popped.

On the subject of that topical Beatles song, we have to admit that, in last week's edition, the final words of Lewis Silkin's adaptation of the song - an ode to the new retirement age of 65 - went AWOL because of a technical problem. So here goes:


'Drop me an email/Send me a text/State your policy/Indicate precisely when I must retire/Miss the boat and you're playing with fire/Don't think I'm a has-been/I'll still have my rights/With lawyers I'll connive/You'll be in doo-doo 'cause I can still sue you/When I'm sixty-five.'