I must confess I do not agree with the sympathy expressed for trainees (‘Trainees facing exploitation on qualifying’, [2009] Gazette, 11 February, 1). I have now been in practice for over 40 years and narrowly escaped payment of the usual 500 guineas when I entered into articles with my first principal. Since then I have seen the profession double from under 50,000 to its present total in excess of six figures.

Trainees are a victim of the popularity of the profession in terms of public perception that becoming a lawyer is a ‘good earner’ and the road to riches. There are a great many practitioners out there, particularly in the high street, who will heartily disagree with that perception. Doesn't the Junior Lawyers Division know that we are currently in a recession, that many law firms are fighting hard to retain their existing admitted and un-admitted staff, and that those trainees who are offered a paralegal post after qualification are extremely lucky to be offered any job at all? Sometimes I think the Law Society and these pressure group organisations are not in the real commercial world. It is a question of supply and demand. Law firms are not a charity.

David Kirwan, Senior partner, Kirwans Solicitors, Liverpool