A melancholy sight confronts the visitor to the Law Society's handsome premises in Chancery Lane.

It is the oak board which faces the main staircase and which in gilt lettering lists the names of Past Presidents of the Society.Until a few years ago, all the names were properly dignified with knighthoods.

Well, nearly all: every 20 years or so a plain John Buggins would appear.

What had befallen Buggins, one wondered?However, such interesting speculations are, for the future, precluded.

In 1989 (in the twilight of the Thatcherite terror), Downing Street withdrew the automatic knighthood previously bestowed on the current President of the Law Society.

At the time, little (if any) public mention of this was made among the profession, though there must have been some private gnashings of teeth: 'All those years, away in London and you said I was going to be Lady Buggins...'I did not think so at the time but, on reflection, the withdrawal of the knighthood was a massive favour to the profession.

The Thatcher government had served formal notice of our expulsion from the establishment.

It amounted also to a more or less frank declaration of hostility or (worse) contempt.The advantage of all this is that, at last, we know without ambiguity where we stand.

Until 1989, we had been able to deceive ourselves that we were an accredited appendage of government enjoying, almost, a 'special relationship'.

As such, the profession could never view any issue in simple terms of its own self- interest.

It had also to consider the 'public benefit' whether actual or alleged.The consequence of this confused and ambiguous perspective was a confused and ambiguous response to the series of blows inflicted upon us.

Blows? The abolition of conveyancing scale fees; the removal of the administration of legal aid; the abrogation of the rules against touting and advertising.It may be that all these changes would have been forced upon us anyway but at least we would not have gone to the gallows like the victim of some Tudor treason trial shouting: 'Long live the King!'The blows continue to fall.

The cumulative effect of the Child Support Act and the Lord Chancellor's new Divorce Bill will inevitably be to remove a substantial section of family law work from lawyers.The franchising scheme is even more sinister.

Its ultimate consequence will be to reduce legal aid fees and at the same time to make firms with a heavy dependence on legal aid work virtual employees of the Legal Aid Board.After each of these defeats, our negotiators have justified themselves by saying that it could have been even worse.

Something, if admittedly very little, has been achieved through 'friendly negotiations'.All this is a sad delusion.

'Friendly negotiations' means that the government achieves only 95% of its objective rather than 100%.

We would do better to acknowledge openly official hostility towards us and plan our affairs accordingly.In the first place, since we no longer have access to the establishment's facilities, we should refuse to go on paying its dues.

Absurdly, for instance, we describe ourselves as officers of the court as though (unlike barristers) we were akin to the chaps down at the Strand, sealers of writs and fillers in of return dates.What does being an officer of the court mean? It means, for a start, that we have less power to change our own rules than does a village stamp collectors' society.

We had, for instance, to obtain the Privy Council's consent before we could agree to pay a salar y (oh all right, 'compensation') to our own President.

It is extraordinary that we have endured such indignities for so long.Having reconciled ourselves to our expulsion and having decided we cannot be the government's friend in any worthwhile sense, we can at least try to make ourselves a formidable enemy.This we should do by conducting our battles with the government on its ground as well as ours.

In the end, we are bound to be routed in fights over conveyancing fees, advertising and the like.

However we present our case, the public will see the matter merely as one of greedy lawyers anxious to keep their troughs topped up.

Issues like franchising, on the other hand, are too arcane to arouse public support.Can we, then, achieve anything against a government so discredited, inept and accident prone as this one? Yes, we can if we look for and take our opportunities.

The Child Support Act was one such.

No government was ever more skilful in constructing an infernal machine which inevitably would explode in its face.

After a quiet debut when people did not realise the Act's implications, opposition to it has gathered momentum and changes are now afoot.

But this opposition will be nothing to the cries of rage which will be heard after April 1996 when the system clobbers the middle classes (including the sheeplike politicians who voted for it in ignorance of its consequences for them).I have myself been campaigning against the CSA in the press since the beginning, with, I believe, some effect.

Now that the trickle of criticism has become a torrent, the government is conspicuously on the run.The campaign mounted by a few individuals would have been far better waged by the Law Society with all its resources.

A determined and skilful public campaign against the CSA would (being an assault on unresisting imbecility) have achieved an easy success.

It would have given the Society a high public profile.

Solicitors would have been seen to win an argument on behalf of the public and only coincidentally themselves.

Most important of all, the government would have been given the chance to see us as a formidable opponent, an animal which when bitten bites back.1994