never judge a judge by the length of his.... service

...clearly this one forgets the importance of equality laws in favour of personal pride:

"Written tests are no guide to your ability to be a judge". A Times article this week where a judge has decided to take action because his years of experience did not give him an advantage in the application process over more junior candidates.

Full article can be found here:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/article5599860.ece

The judge was told in a “dismissive and cursory” letter that his application would be taken no further.

I'm having a difficult job not attacking this article due to my own personal experiences of applications in the legal sector. This man has been turned down for a job as he was unable to get through the sifting stage of the process. The article makes it clear that this stage was in place to sift out candidates who couldn't demonstrate that they met the minimum standards. The judge evidently found the questions so trite that he reflected his superiority in his over-concise and cynical, albeit correct, responses: which were then interpreted as insufficient.

With great power comes great arrogance. Perhaps the judge would be surprised to hear that in this tricky economic times a law and LPC graduate, with top 5% academic qualifications, who has taken all practical steps to get on the legal career ladder has an even more torrid time. This type of candidate appreciates these "tests" which eliminate the often deceiving weighting placed on this so called experience - experience which in 9 out of 10 cases is gained from nepotism of some sorts - or otherwise greater opportunities being offered to those in circumstances where they can afford to work for free.

So when employers start developing ways of judging pure merit - through an extended incremental recruitment process (which may well be arbitrary to some) you would only complain if, on failure, you reflect that you could have tried harder - yet this judge's inflated ego suggests you shouldn't have had to! He states that "any bar student could swot up" - you could argue that if any judge swotted up too they could do equally well if not better! Essentially everyone has the same chance - some might find it easier if they have more experience, some might try harder if they haven't - and following, if some have learnt more from their experience it will come out at a later stage of application anyway. This is the whole point: equality of opportunity. The best candidate might never have been given the opportunity to have been a judge already for 6 years: why should they be dismissed at such an early stage in favour of someone who had?

Access to jobs is an issue for another day - but allowing candidates an equal opportunity to be heard by employers is far fairer than risking institutionaled discrimination to prevail: even if some overqualified candidates believe they have a predetermined right.