Students - criminal and legal - top the agenda

August, traditionally a slow month for news, seemed nothing of the sort this week, as the Hamiltons' media circus jostled for front page space with the Paul Burrell theft charges and the Michael Barrymore saga.

In what was a tabloid editor's silly season dream, a report this week also made the astonishing claim that 'criminals pay to train their own lawyers' (Sunday Express, 19 August); specifically that 'drug barons and organised crime gangs are funding law and accountancy degrees for students to provide them with professional advice for their illegal activities'.

Student hardship is obviously more of a problem than previously thought, as the report, released by the National Criminal Intelligence Service, said hard-up law students are being supported through university 'by mafia-style gangs' (Daily Telegraph, 20 August) who 'pay students to train in return for joining that gang when they finish their studies, normally on far higher salaries than they could expect at a conventional law firm'.Whether criminally minded or not, law students were in the news this week as the annual post A-Level scramble for university places began.

The Times (17 August) quoted David Chambers, head of social sciences and law at London's Greenwich University, and - judging by his comments - presumably an ex-lawyer himself.

He justified his rejection of applicants who fell just short of their A-Level grades with the argument that 'law is a degree second to none in difficulty' - further mathematics and astrophysics presumably being a walk in the park - 'and we will not just fill up places with people who might struggle and then drop out.' He did not mention whether students generously funded by the mafia would be welcome.Underworld-sponsored lawyers would doubtless have little interest in the Financial Times's story - which came almost two months after it was first reported in the Gazette - that the Foreign Office is establishing a pro bono panel of lawyers 'who will work for free on overseas cases involving Britons' (7 August).

The panel, initially proposed as part of former Foreign Secretary Robin Cook's plans for an 'ethical foreign policy', would 'assist Britons jailed overseas' on issues such as fair trials.Fair trials may be a thing of the past in the workplace, as a forthcoming report, discussed in The Guardian (17 August), highlighted how '16% of people in the labour forces say they have had a problem with their rights at work in the last five years', and 'half of those who sought advice found that their problem was not covered by the law'.The paper claimed that the 130,000 cases that did go to tribunal last year 'are merely the tip of the iceberg', and although 'industrial action may be at its lowest level for decades', the paper concludes that 'relations at work are not at all harmonious'.Employment tribunals are not covered by legal aid, although this is not a fact widely known by the vast majority of people.

A recent poll revealed the lack of public knowledge about the legal aid system, according to The Financial Times (11 August), fewer than one in five people is aware that legal aid is not available for the majority of personal injury claims.For those lawyers who are at a loss as to how to spend their salary, why not follow the example of Andy Kerman, a London-based millionaire solicitor, and sponsor a blonde20-something Russian ballerina.Mr Kerman, 55, told The Independent (17 August) how his relationship with the 'exquisite' Anastasia Volochkova, 25, was purely that of a patron and protegee, and had absolutely 'nothing to do with the recent collapse of his marriage'.

He also reminded the reporter that his firm, St James-based Kerman & Co, 'handles libel cases'.Victoria MacCallum