Charles Elly left observers flabbergasted recently when, in a speech to legal aid practitioners, he hit out at the Legal Aid Board in terms so vitriolic as to prompt a furious backlash from Steve Orchard, the board's chief executive.The words used seemed seriously out of step with Mr Elly who, associates agree, is the embodiment of sweet reason.

Reflecting last week on the furore whi ch followed the speech, he admitted to being troubled.

No, he did not retract the essence of what was said: 'I think what was said was right,' and it was 'aimed at a particular audience'.

But he very much regretted that his words bit so deep at the board.

'I am particularly sorry if the chief executive or anybody else at the board should have thought there was anything personal about it.

I do not like to think that I have caused people a lot of heartache and hurt.'Such sensitivity is Mr Elly's hallmark, observers confirm.

The new President is uncomfortable with confrontation, preferring to get results through patient consensus-building.

Indeed, he worries that he may be overly consensual for an office which may call on him to come out with all guns blazing from time to time.

But he believes it is best to exhaust the talking process before reaching for the megaphone.

Mr Elly is disarmingly frank about what he sees as his shortcomings for the office.

He lists his scant knowledge of the laws of other jurisdictions and his limited command of French as 'things I worry about'.

But a telephone poll of half-a-dozen practitioners last week produced no evidence that their greatest need was for a polyglot leader with in-depth knowledge of the Napoleonic Code.

More pressing for them was how they might get through the next year without coming a cropper.

Those dependent on legal aid wanted Mr Elly to keep his eyes fixed on franchising.

'You can't trust the board,' one remarked.

Others wanted him to do something about the profession's image.

'It is at an all time low,' said one.

A newly qualified solicitor wanted him to 'do something fast about jobs'.Mr Elly might be just the person to tackle this list.

His commitment to legal aid extends - unusually for an older solicitor - to doing regular stints as a duty solicitor.

'It keeps your feet on the ground,' he remarks.

Also, his firm, Reynolds Parry-Jones & Crawford, High Wycombe, which draws 20% of its income from legal aid, will soon join the ranks of franchise applicants.

Mr Elly's virtual absence from the firm during his vice-presidential year has caused the application to be delayed.

He explains that his partners have had to compensate for his absence by concentrating on fee-earning at the expense of future planning.

But it is all ahead of him and he sympathises with those who have found the process very burdensome.As for doing something about the image of the profession, Mr Elly hopes to tackle this by making the profession feel a bit better about itself.

His aim will be to restore some of the cohesiveness which has been eroded over time by cut-throat competition and the frantic pace at which practitioners are now expected to turn over work.

Central to his plan is a programme of Any Questions-type regional meetings at which practitioners will be able to put their concerns directly to Law Society officers and staff.

He hopes these gatherings will not only serve to bring practitioners together, but to erase some of the apathy - in some cases frank antipathy - solicitors feel towards their professional body.

'[The meetings] might just help to start a feeling that we are all together and that it is not a case of them and us.'One practitioner who knows Mr Elly only slightly commented last week that the President's 'priestly' image was probably 'just the ticket' to rescue a profession which is being regarded with increasing distrust.

The remark was made in ignorance of Mr Elly's deep religious faith.

It is a faith the genesis of which may be traced in part to the young Elly's pe rformances in church as a gifted boy soprano.

There is a record, he reveals bashfully, of his performance of 'How beautiful are the feet', from the Messiah, at home somewhere.

When he left school Mr Elly seriously considered a career in the church before finally deciding that he could best fulfil his desire to help people by becoming a solicitor.

But throughout his life he has maintained contact with the church, holding several offices, and working consistently for charity.

However, the last thing the President wants is to come across as a pious do-gooder.

'I am not that sort of person.

It would be a wholly false impression.

I do have faith but I do not push it down people's throats.' Indeed, his concept of faith is wide and, living in multi-racial High Wycombe, he says he 'appreciates other beliefs as strongly as I appreciate my own'.

Mr Elly's other abiding interest is theatre.

His thespian past included a hugely ambitious production of Oedipus Rex while at Oxford.

The other performance which sticks in his mind is the William Douglas Home comedy, The Chiltern Hundreds.

He played Beecham, the butler.

'A lovely middle-aged role.

Perhaps I have always been middle-aged,' he remarks.

Certainly the new President lays no claim to radicalism.

'I don't have a burning desire to change the world, but I do have a desire to make things better than they are.' His conservative stance has not, however, stopped him winning admirers amongst the younger sector.

'I think he is brilliant,' said one newly qualified solicitor who has been impressed with Mr Elly's willingness to get close to the particular problems facing those just starting out.