At the annual solicitors conference in Manchester last month, the Vice-Chancellor, Sir Richard Scott, was frank about the new role of 'head of civil justice', given to him in the response to Lord Woolf's proposals in 'Access to justice'.

Sir Richard reminded the audience that the heads of civil justice were the Lord Chief Justice and the Master of the Rolls and said that his new role was mainly to act as 'a focus for the funding requirements of the civil justice system'.The Law Society is now pressing the government to give the title of head of civil justice a statutory foundation.

The Society is also pushing for the proposed civil justice council to be given real power.

In both his interim and final reports, Lord Woolf advocated the establishment of the council as 'a continuing body with responsibility for overseeing and co-ordinating the implementation of my proposals'.

But no mention has been made of the council in the Civil Procedure Bill, which was published last week.The Lord Chancellor's intentions have become clearer with the publication, also last week, of 'The way forward', his strategy document for implementing Lord Woolf's ref orms.

The report speaks of a civil justice council allowing 'representation of the participants in the civil justice system' and providing a 'two-way channel of communication'.

However, the document is silent regarding the task of overseeing the implementation of the reforms.'The Council seems in danger of being relegated to a talking shop,' says Diane Burleigh, head of the Society's court business team.

'We think it should be more influential than that.

We are not envisaging a large committee, but one which can act as a driving force to push the reforms forward and respond quickly to requests from the Lord Chancellor.'Ms Burleigh said the Society was also concerned about the composition of the single rules committee, which, under the Civil Procedure Bill, will draw up a unified set of rules for both High Court and county courts.

Under the Bill, the committee will contain two advocates and two litigators.

The Society would like to have four litigators.

Ms Burleigh said this would give the committee greater 'breadth of experience'.Nigel Tomkins, a member of the executive committee of the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL), agreed.

'It is important that there is representation on the rule-making committee that adequately reflects the variety of litigation.

With solicitors' experience increasingly limited to specialist fields, it is worrying if some of the fields are denied representation.'On the question of fixed inter partes costs for fast track personal injury cases that Lord Woolf suggested should be capped at £2500 -- the subject closest to APIL's heart -- Mr Tomkins said that he had some reason to be optimistic.

In 'The way forward', the Lord Chancellor said that 'detailed work would be necessary to quantify the levels of fixed costs on the fast track'.Mr Tomkins commented: 'It's a step forward that they are already saying extra work is needed.

We hope we will persuade them to think again about the whole concept of fixed costs.

We are opposed to this concept in every way, and we believe our research has shown they are a bad idea because of the nature and diversity of personal injury litigation.'Overshadowing the Woolf debate from the beginning has been the question of resources.

'The way forward' makes it clear that money that the Lord Chancellor accepts needs to be invested in information technology and training will have to come from his budget.

'Unless the Lord Chancellor can give us some explanation, I do not see how there can possibly be enough money in his budget,' Mr Tomkins said.

'A lack of proper funding will lead to a shambles, with the whole court system grinding to a halt.''Structural changes' in the administration of the Courts Service are identified as one area where savings could be made.

An LCD spokeswoman said no details of the changes had yet been worked out.Dick Greenslade, the president of the District Judges Association, said: 'It has always been clear that the Woolf reforms would involve an element of restructuring in the way the county courts use their staff.

The intention is to move people away from being paper handlers to being involved in case management of providing more assistance to customers.'Ms Burleigh emphasised the need for training of court staff, as well as judges, to make the Woolf reforms a reality.

She said that 'The way forward' contained one particularly positive development by considering the possibility of joint training of judges, lawyers and court staff.KEY PROVISIONSThe Civil Procedure Bill, due to have its second reading in the House of Lords this week , includes the following key provisions.-- A unified rule committee will be set up.

It will have the power to make rules of court for all civil, non-family litigation in the county court, High Court and Civil Division of the Court of Appeal.-- The committee will have 12 members: the Master of the Rolls, Lord Woolf; Vice-Chancellor Sir Richard Scott; four other judges; four lawyers -- two advocates and two litigators; and two lay members.-- Committee members are required to make rules that are 'simple and simply expressed'.

All rules must be approved by the Lord Chancellor.-- There will be a new system for approval and co-ordination of county court practice directions.-- The Bill aims to place on a statutory footing the jurisdiction of the courts to make Anton Piller orders requiring a person to give entry to premises for the purposes of preserving evidence required for civil proceedings.