Legal Recruitment Blog

There has been a story in the Gazette recently about a barrister being turned down for a case because he was Afghan and not a while male barrister. Cue uproar in the legal profession and quite rightly too.  My own experience of this dates back to practice over 20 years ago when a number of clients would reject the opportunity to be represented by colleagues who were Asian or female, and instead ask for a white male to represent them. It was not always clear whether this was because the white male in question was a well regarded 25 year qualified solicitor with a reputation for being able to get anybody off, but the way some of the clients asked was pretty indicative of someone with racist or sexist opinions, and impressively at the practice I worked at, the partners would have none of it. Similarly, I was aware of practices where they would bend over backwards to accommodate the wishes of such unpleasant clients simply to ensure they got the business.  However, this t...