The top-secret report on legal aid which has been prepared by Frontier Economics for the Department for Constitutional Affairs and the Legal Services Commission (see news analysis, [2004] Gazette, 7 May, page 10) contains some fiendishly complicated mathematical equations, which are used to work out, among other things, the average level of remuneration a law firm receives for public work.

The survey - surprise, surprise - found that there was no need to increase rates.

However, we think we could have saved them a lot of number-crunching and head-scratching - not to mention the trees that were felled to make up the 157-page report - by using another equation that would have enabled the researchers to reach the same result.

The equation is: media hostility to legal aid + run-up to general election + general unpopularity of lawyers = fat chance of any more dosh.