In the interview with Jonathan Djanogly it is interesting to note that, while not wanting to discuss the legal aid budget, the minister is quoted as saying: ‘Our priority is not about what lawyers do or the number of lawyers there are doing things. Our priority is legal representation for vulnerable people. The customer or client needs to be the priority.’ What Mr Djanogly fails to understand is that successive governments have treated the vulnerable as legal ‘consumers’ with purchasing power. This is a complete fiction.

The mess over legal aid arose largely because there has been: no proper ‘ring-fencing’ between the criminal and civil budgets for decades; no understanding of the businesses that undertake publicly funded work; and no real interest in what experienced, longstanding legal aid practitioners have been saying is wrong with the way legal aid has been administered.

When money is tight, no government is really going to be concerned about the quality of legal services the vulnerable receive, as long as that sector of the public is covered. My concern is that good legal aid businesses are closing in droves. With no investment in the future of legal aid practitioners, it will be left to the less qualified or less experienced to cope within another fiction carved from the ‘Big Society’ model, which is that lawyers must be called to arms to do more pro bono work.

The legal aid landscape will change in the medium to long term, with the vulnerable perhaps having to do more of a DIY job on their own legal problems, or finding no one who can properly serve their needs. It is a case of waiting for a series of injustices to arise, before the government gets the wake-up call.

Debra Wilson, partner, Anthony Gold, London SW16