Middlesex may be a county that administratively disappeared about 40 years ago, but that does not prevent the lawyers of north-west London and borders from maintaining tradition - and a local law society of that name. Indeed, if the size of the Middlesex Law Society's annual bash - held last week at the Royal Courts of Justice - is anything to go by, then there's still some life yet in an otherwise ghostly county. This was a gala event by any standard, complete with dancing from India and a gourmet curry supper. In fact, supper was the big theme, with Middlesex president and former national Law Society Council member Maria Fernandes billing the event as the 'last supper for the Lord Chancellor'. Presumably, when the Middlesex hierarchy was putting together the theme for the dinner, all the signs coming out of Whitehall indicated that the title of Lord Chancellor was for the chop. Unfortunately, governments tend to backtrack and the event actually coincided with strong steers from Lord Falconer that the title would not go the way of Middlesex itself. That didn't prevent him from keeping the assembled luminaries well entertained with remarks along the lines of 'I never realised how fat I was until I became Lord Chancellor and was informed by the tabloid press'. However, Ms Fernandes - who is married to the former minister Keith Vaz - was not prepared to let Lord Falconer off the hook. She turned serious by attacking the government's money laundering legislation as 'a minefield of rules and regulations that fail to tackle serious crime', and lambasting some ministers for 'deliberate tactics to smear solicitors to justify cuts in the legal aid budget'. She continued: 'The crisis facing dentistry will come to pass with solicitors and legal aid - but by that time it will be too late.' Soon, then, legal aid and Middlesex will be synonymous with a bygone era.