Legal services in Northern Ireland are in crisis. There is no doubt about that. On the one side stand the forces of Minister Ford, Alliance,  and  his well paid officials. Already they are two times winners over the legal profession.

As in all causes , there are two sides. There are fat cats in my profession. Some knew exactly how to play the game and became very rich. But they did not steal the money. Ford’s officials paid them.

There are also what a famous English rugby player called “the old farts”, who run and are part of the system.

At the other end the majority of barristers do their best to represent their clients.

The menace for the citizen is that the State, the Assembly, wants no opposition. Paul Given would have flourished in Berlin.

The unholy alliance of DUP/Sinn Fein/IRA wants no opposition.

At present, the citizen relies on Jim Allister , Stephen Nolan and the legal profession.

Where do the LGBT community, the poor , the oppressed, those without hope, go for support?

In the old bar library, I sat at a table with five colleagues. Of the six, two were Protestants from North Belfast , four were Roman Catholics  from Belfast and elsewhere. All were the first in their family to go to university .

If minister Ford has his way nobody , client or your child, will have access to the legal system , unless you are very rich.

Is that what you want?