When Sir Stephen Lander - chairman of the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) - addressed delegates at the Criminal Law Solicitors Association conference last weekend, he had quite a success story to tell. Some 300 arrests since the agency's inception in April this year, with 70 cases through the courts already. So when the time came for questions from the floor, and solicitor Greg Powell's hand immediately shot up, Sir Stephen was no doubt expecting a query on the detection methods that had led to such success, or the amount of criminal proceeds that have been recouped. No wonder he looked momentarily stunned when Mr Powell asked: 'Have you made any assessment of the impact of your activities on the legal aid budget?' Quickly recovering himself, Sir Stephen clearly decided that honesty was the best policy. 'The honest answer is no,' he said, adding wryly, 'we have got problems of our own over money.' SOCA's whopping £400 million budget is supposed to come from several different sources, he revealed, but 'only the Home Office grant has arrived so far. We're hoping the money will be here soon, or we won't be able to pay our bills'. Perhaps the SOCA head has more in common with legal aid lawyers than they might have thought.