In September, the Bar Standards Board (BSB) launched its third consultation addressing the implications of the Legal Services Act (LSA). The Bar Council (via its specifically-appointed task force) has been monitoring the process and canvassing the views of the profession to ensure the most advantageous future for everyone concerned.

The general feeling among barristers at the criminal Bar has been that there will be an inexorable drift towards much closer ties with forms of solicitors. The principal reasons for this are self-evident. It was thought that prosecution work would be increasingly handled by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) while most of the larger firms of criminal solicitors were organising themselves to bring much of their advocacy work in-house.

Is it in the financial interests of the CPS to train and pay salaries to employed advocates, and how will that model survive in the post-cuts environment? Can firms of defence solicitors afford to employ top-class advocates? The model always proved economically sound and has historically been good reason for using the independent Bar.

The current consultation issued by Baroness Ruth Deech, chair of the BSB, focuses on the entities with which barristers may choose to develop their business under a post-LSA regime and will conclude on 23 December. The various entities proposed, including procurement companies, barrister-only entities (BOEs) legal disciplinary partnerships (LDPs) and alternative business structures (ABSs) remain possibilities. All have been recognised as opportunities for barristers doing publicly-funded work, which they are urged to seriously consider or risk the survival of their practice.

The general feeling in civil-only sets of chambers is that it is imperative to remain independent if at all possible. The majority of civil practitioners feel that vehicles such as procurement companies might provide an opportunity to bolt on an adjunct to their principal business but, beyond that, independence is everything and partnership is neither necessary nor desirable.

That view is strongly held in my own chambers: it suits the interests of the client and the economic realities of solicitors for the professions to remain separate. The added cost of employing a barrister is far outweighed by the added value brought to that case by the employment of a specialist in the field, paid on a piece-work basis. We enjoy cordial relationships with our instructing solicitors. We pride ourselves on the service they (and the client) receive. We do not see it as broken and we don't see a need to fix it.

There might be opportunities in the future for barristers to find themselves in organisations or even partnerships with non-lawyers. It is possible that this could be the future for the legal profession. However, I do not believe it will be nor that it should be. It is in the public interest for the Bar to provide specialist and, above all else, independent advice and advocacy services within the framework of an independent organisational setting.

The financial model and the training programmes within chambers can perpetuate the vitality of the Bar. Regulatory change might bring ancillary advantage but the core business and standards should remain. There remains too much demand for a strong, independent referral Bar. Solicitors want to instruct counsel who know the law and can handle complex factual situations so that individual and corporate clients are expertly advised and represented.

Nicholas Braslavsky QC is head of chambers at Kings Chambers in Manchester and Leeds.