lawyers

Spoiler: we end with walks covering Legal London.

.........

"Something for the weekend, sir?". As an eight-year old lad I am seated on a plank placed over the barber's chair. My father went first, while I amused myself with tales of Dan Dare from The Eagle magazine. Now my turn, for a brusquely delivered short back and sides. Customer care has not been invented yet for kids. As I sit rigidly in my place a middle-aged chap from another chair goes up to pay. The question is delivered, and as a result some further commerce is transacted, although what comes out from under the counter and disappears into a brown paper bag, I cannot tell.

They say that August is a dead month for news. Still, a few commercial and private client lawyers might have choked on their Bouillabaisse upon hearing of HMRC's announced consultation on a proposal for sanctions against those who "design, market or facilitate the use of tax avoidance arrangements which are defeated by HMRC".

In the Today Programme after the announcement, the focus was on financial advisers and on accountants as the lined up target "middlemen".