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The expansion in profession but declined in quality. I remember receiving a call for a fact finding survey, being undertaken by Law Society back in winter of 2013 (during my days as a solicitor), with respect to the challenges the law firms were then facing. I simply responded that the biggest challenge that i had started to feel was the competition with incompetents. I explained that I did not want to sound arrogant or Mr perfect but it was big struggle to beat the quotation that newly formed firms (headed by significantly less experienced and qualified professionals) that were authorised without giving any thoughts if there was a need for disproportionate numbers of firms in one square mile. The fees quoted by such newcomers was surprisingly more than half of the fees I was charging. this had increased adverse competition. I would say adverse because you would have to compromise on quality by accepting more work on cheap price. the principles of high street practices would know the difficulties of meeting the business expense, contrary to misnomer beliefs of regulator, and sometimes you would accept instructions on any costs because you would have to either pay salary or business rates or rent etc. hence you cannot have both quantity and quality at the same price if you are struggling with the costs because you would not be able to afford to recruit quality people to do proper job for the same reasons that you are being denied appropriate fees due to the blessings of your regulator that has yet to learn the basic economic principle of supply and demand. I wish the regulator would adopt some measures, at authorisation stage, by at least requiring a decent business plan and consider if business plan contain some market research with respect to demand and supply. This would not only assist potential COLP and COFA but would also improve quality of the work. At the end of day this is a noble profession more than a mere business and reputation is to stay intact.