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Friday, 16 October 2015

51% OF NEW J.P.s ARE OVER 50

For those who rightly or wrongly consider the age profile of magistrates  is too old the figures released this week on new J.P. appointments will bring little to cheer about. Over half are over the age of 50.  The reason for this is really quite simple; only those who can afford even the limited time they must serve bother to apply and those of course have seen off most of their mortgage and occupy well paid positions.  I am not for one minute an advocate of paying magistrates but this profile is another reason why the position of the traditional J.P. must be in jeopardy.
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2 comments:

  1. MrD17 October 2015 at 17:46

    It is true to say that few will be mature enough to consider applying until they reach the age of 30 or so, so if you consider a normal distribution, then the distribution over age is not unreasonable; indeed, I wouldn't mind betting that the DJ distribution is even more skewed to older age groups.

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  2. Anonymous19 October 2015 at 14:07

    Figures look OK to me if you are going to use the age of 50 as some sort of benchmark and then consider the demographic overall.

    Yes, 51% fall into the age group 50 to 65 but then 49% are in the age range of 18 to 49. In other words, not too far short of a good balance overall if you are only going to use the age of 50 as a benchmark. It does seem that a certain amount of cherry picking was done to suit the argument you wished to proffer in your blog.

    The important detail is contained within the other ranges where it can be argued that there are too few new appointees in some of the younger age ranges but then that has always been the case. I can see nothing happening that is going to change that apart from the occasional ridiculous appointment of an 18 year old as was reported in the last few weeks.

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