The Legal Services Commission is in favour of Clementi model A - surprise, surprise (see [2004] Gazette, 10 June, 1).

What better way can there be for the commission to ensure that no restraint is placed on its rampant abuse of its monopolistic position as purchaser of public legal services than to pass the regulatory function to another government-appointed body?

Of course, the commission itself provides a lesson as to the hollowness of claims that the appointment of solicitors and barristers to such quangos is a sufficient means of ensuring the requisite independence of lawyers and the legal system from government.

Instead, the need is to beef up the Law Society and Bar Council so that they can properly defend an independent public legal service from a predatory government determined to achieve an on-the-cheap toothless shambles.

City pro bono work is nice but it is time for the powerful to step up to the plate and take on the government in defence of the public service and the poor and powerless it serves.

Patrick Lefevre, co-ordinator, Brent Community Law Centre, London