The Legal Services Consumer Panel is sometimes dismissed as a lightweight quango, but looks can be deceptive.

This is the body which, for just £204,000 of your money, has generated 10 news releases in the past year and produced nine reports.

Last week’s annual report was certainly an enlightening read.

Elisabeth Davies, chair of the panel, was particularly bullish about the organisation’s ability to influence the public.

In her foreword we also learned that the panel’s consumer impact report (published in December, with the Twitter link retweeted twice thus far) has become a ‘go to’ evidence source, influencing not just the oversight regulator but all regulatory bodies.

‘There is no doubt in my mind,’ she goes on, ‘that our report on McKenzie friends has reframed the debate not just about them and their role but about the wider market and what this means for access to justice.’

And of course, who could forget the ‘2020’ report in which the panel established ‘legal ecosystem’ in the professional lexicon?

Last time we looked, the consumer panel had a total of 193 followers on Twitter.

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