As his flagship piece of legislation - the Access to Justice Bill - begins its journey through the House of Commons this week, the Lord Chancellor is in buoyant mood, confident that the few set backs suffered in the House of Lords, can easily be reversed.

'Excellent progress' is how he sums up the parliamentary journey so far.

He counts it as 'a remarkable achievement' that the Bill took only three hits in a legislative chamber where the government does not have a majority.

In the more politically supportive climate of the Commons, he looks forward to undoing the damage 'with the greatest of ease'.But does Lord Irvine accept that there are serious and genuinely-held fears about the legislation's impact on access to justice under a cash-limited regime? And does he also accept that solicitors are worried about surviving in what looks like an uncertain future of legal aid contract bidding and conditional fee funding?Such fears, he replies, are 'grossly exaggerated', but before going on to expound emphatically about how 'millions' of people will be afforded first time ever access to justice through conditional fees, he delivers what amounts to a good old fashioned lecture to solicitors: 'Let me say straight away that legal aid does not exist to provide livelihoods for solicitors - it exists to benefit the public [and that is] what informs my actions and decisions'.Lord Irvine continues: 'What I would like to hear solicitors acknowledging is that the extension of conditional fees is good for legal business.

Because if it is true, and I have no doubt that it is, that millions are brought into access to justice for the first time that means more business for lawyers and more litigation'.Lord Irvine claims not to have the slightest doubt that the insurance industry will ultimately offer a sufficient variety of products to make conditional fee funding feasible for litigants in a wide range of cases.

He only wishes solicitors would buck up a bit and see the opportunities.

'I wish that solicitors had as much confidence in themselves as the insurance industry has in itself'.

He says solicitors are victims of having been 'feather-bedded by legal aid.

[Solicitors] do not look in a progressive way at their business opportunities because legal aid has inculcated in them a culture that they are entitled to be insured by the state against their costs when they lose, and I am afraid that culture simply has to be broken'.But he maintains that insurance will afford the kind of cushion for solicitors that other business people have to do without.

'Solicitors are very lucky in that they are not going to be asked to put up all the up-front costs because I have complete confidence in the availability of [insurance] products on terms which solicitors should find acceptable to their clients'.The suggestion that insurers might cherry pick the best cases leaving the rest uninsured and perhaps never pursued, serves only to remind Lord Irvine to lecture solicitors on 'another unpalatable truth', and that is that 'far too many weak cases have gone forward on legal aid'.He says that irrespective of the means of funding - legal aid or conditional fees - solicitors have a responsibility to ensure that only the strong cases go ahead.

It is, he says, the 'socially correct' thing to do.

He elaborates: 'I wouldn't litigate myself in a case concerning my interest or my family's interest unless I was satisfied that my chances of success were at least 75% - because otherwise I would not think that it was worth the stress and misery'.

Lord Irvine suggests that solicitors may be 'staggered' to hear him say this.

But much more likely is that it will cause them to wonder whether in his previous career at the Bar, Lord Irvine adhered religiously to the 75% rule in the interests of social correctness.But what is the evidence that solicitors are pursuing unmeritorious cases wholesale? The very high success rate of personal injury (PI) cases would suggest that solicitors are getting it right most of the time and recent research by the Legal Aid Board indicates that solicitors have a good record of predicting the outcomes of cases, involving money claims.

It transpires that Lord Irvine is referring to a number of cases in the Chancery division.

More than a year ago, he recalls, Chancery judges alerted him to a number of instances where, in their view, it was 'nothing short of a disgrace' that the cases, which were legally aided, had got that far in the first place.

He accepts that these were complicated cases in the Chancery division and acknowledges solicitors' excellent record on PI.

All the more reason, he concludes, why solicitors should have confidence in their ability to take cases on a conditional fees basis.Another key reform on which the Lord Chancellor has staked his reputation is the much touted Community Legal Service (CLS).

Nothing concrete has materialised on this since Lord Irvine outlined his vision at a lecture in London last November.

Then he stated the commitment as follows: 'We will ensure that a comprehensive network of advice points is developed across England and Wales.

They will deliver legal advice, and representation where appropriate, to the disadvantaged and the socially excluded, in the areas of law which most directly affect their everyday lives'.

He held out the prospect of funding for taking cases to tribunals and for mediation, but immediately lowered expectations by emphasising that there would be no new money.A consultation paper putting flesh on the bones - some would say the basic skeleton has yet to be put on show - was scheduled for the spring, but so far nothing h as materialised.

What is happening? Civil servants murmur about a convention of not publishing major policy documents in the pre-local election purdah period.

But Lord Irvine frankly admits that additional work has to be done.

It will be a better paper, he promises, for the delay.He describes the CLS in near evangelistic terms as a 'classic example of joined-up government' - the latest buzz phrase in Whitehall.

He explains: 'There are all sorts of groups and bodies out there doing an enormous amount of good but to a greater or lesser extent what they are doing is unco-ordinated.

The Community Legal Service is all about co-ordination - getting rid of overlaps'.

He reports that feedback from the pilot that is underway involving six pioneering local authorities, the Legal Aid Board and other funders has been promising but it has also exposed some problems.Lord Irvine is impatient with those - he is tempted to call them 'killjoys' - who query how the CLS can possibly be adequately resourced without new money.

The 'honest answer', he says, is that it is a matter of priorities.

He explains: 'I do think for example that in [cases before] employment tribunals [where] the decisions may affect hundreds if not thousands, it is in the public interest [to provide] public support'.

But to make a priority of employment tribunals necessarily means less for other areas.While the jury will remain out for a long time on the CLS concept, Lord Irvine says he is 'absolutely determined' to make it work.

'I am conscious that I will be judged by this and I do not want to be associated with failure.' He would hope to have that consultation paper ready by the summer.Last month, the Lord Chancellor sent a warning shot across the bows of the solicitors' profession when he signalled he would take reserved powers to intervene in complaints handling if, as he put it, the profession did not 'put its house in order'.

This week he repeated the warning, expressing deep concern about the 'fearfully worrying backlog' at the Office for the Supervision of Solicitors.

He added that he 'would not be in the least surprised' if the Legal Services Ombudman's report scheduled for July had 'some very hard things to say which the profession will find very, very embarrassing'.The problem, he says, lies with the 'cultural attitude' solicitors bring to complaints.

'They treat it too often as another piece of litigation.

When I read sometimes the actual correspondence between a solicitor and his client with a complaint I find that the solicitor treats this as litigation by another name'.Lord Irvine went on to issue a plea to solicitors: 'Be much more self critical, much more conciliatory and take a realistic view of how a generous admission, if it is proper to make it, [could] save heavy costs in their own time through dealing with a complaint in an aggressive way'.

The net effect of such an approach would also be to improve public regard for solicitors, he suggested.Lord Irvine said he would not activate the powers unless it became absolutely necessary.

'I believe that the solicitors' profession is well able to regulate itself and self-regulation is the ideal but it is widely thought that self-regulation is not working satisfactorily.

My object in taking reserved powers would be only to exercise them as a matter of last resort but in the knowledge that the existence of these powers would operate as a strong influence on solicitors to put their own house in order.' He suggested that his move would be regarded by the powers that be in the legal profession as being 'the spur that they had been looking for'.The Lord Chancellor has taken every public opportunity to demonstrate his anti-discriminatory credentials.

With the catchy phrase 'don't be shy, apply' he launched a bid at the 1998 Minority Lawyers Conference to encourage ethnic minority lawyers to apply for judicial positions and for silk appointments.

He repeated the call at the same event this year and reported some progress in the numbers coming forward.

For example, 7.5% of the current assistant recorder applicants are of ethnic minority origin compared to 3.9% last year.

And of the new assistant recorders announced on the South Eastern circuit, 8% are of ethnic minority origin.

This he declared a 'first class result'.Yet within days of the conference Lord Irvine had suffered a humiliating defeat in an employment tribunal, having been found to have indirectly discriminated against a solicitor, Jane Coker, in the selection of a trusted friend, Garry Hart, as special advisor.

During the hearing, Lord Irvine was depicted as someone who moved in 'overwhelmingly male' circles and who had few female or ethnic minority friends.

He came under fire for a press statement dismissing Ms Coker's claim as 'mischievous'.Mention of the case causes obvious discomfort and he will not be drawn, explaining that an appeal will be lodged as soon as the tribunal chairman issues his reasons.

But he says he does not regret the 'mischievous' comment.Within days of that conference also, Lord Irvine's department was taken to task by the President of the Law Society for breaching the government's own guidelines, by failing to ensure provisions of the Access to Justice Bill were not potentially discriminatory.

The President alleged that the proposal to limit legal aid contracts to a much reduced number of legal firms, could adversely affect women, the disabled and ethnic minorities.Lord Irvine dismisses this as 'an astonishing proposition' and seizes the opportunity to return to lecturing mode: 'I want to make one thing absolutely plain.

An integral part of my reforms is that the public will be guaranteed that the legal aid lawyer they go to is quality assured.

And if you tell me that cuts across the freedom of anyone to choose any lawyer they like to represent them on legal aid, I say emphatically that it is in the public interest'.Off the lectern, Lord Irvine has lately shown some empathy with solicitors who have genuine survival-related concerns about the number of legal aid contracts that will be available in the future.

In letters to lawyers' groups he has attempted to allay fears by giving his best estimates of the number of contracts that will be on offer.

For example, all firms with family, immigration and mental health franchises are guaranteed a relevant contract in the first round beginning in January 2000.

And he has also indicated an intention to guarantee first round contracts from April 2001 for all firms with relevant franchises in non-family civil litigation.

Beyond that timeframe he emphasises, guarantees are out of the question, if only because they would frustrate the development of competitive contracting.

This is what the future actually holds for legal aid solicitors.