NOTHING ADDS UP

I agree entirely with Janet Hopkins' letter (see [2002] Gazette, 24 January, 17) that we should stop using the pro bono euphemism.

However, I would be even more blunt and suggest the expression 'working for nothing'.

The Solicitor-General, Harriet Harman, of course, is treading in the footsteps of the Conservative Lord Chancellor, Lord Mackay, who made public in the mid- 1990s his expectation that we would all do legal work for nothing.

Ever since he did so, I have been waiting for those outside the legal profession to be called on to work for nothing as well.

Why are government ministers holding back from imposing similar expectations on banks, estate agents, accountants, airlines, computer suppliers, supermarkets, dentists, property developers, insurers, newspapers and even politicians? The only bodies of people who for many decades have done some of their work for nothing for altruistic motives are lawyers and doctors.

In return, they are now the two professions most subject to regulation and to public castigation at every real or rumoured opportunity.Elizabeth Woodall, legal executive, Ludlow, Shropshire