A sow's ear from a silk's gown?

The first report of the Commission for Judicial Appointments will come as a surprise to some.

There were doubts about the point of a body with powers that fell well short of making the appointments; but in investigating a handful of complaints, the commission - less surprisingly - identified many shortcomings in the system.

The report sheds light on how applications for silk are handled.

Last year, a single official at the Lord Chancellor's Department, up against tight deadlines, had the job of deciding which of 456 applications - generating more than 4,700 responses from consultees - warranted referral to Lord Irvine.

This was, the commission concluded, 'an impossible task', which in turn meant there was no clear audit trail of the decision reached.

Disregarding for a moment the wider argument about whether we should have QCs and, if so, whether the government should be involved in appointing them, the problem is less with those who make it than with those who do not.

The commission and solicitors interviewed in our feature are concerned about how some candidates are overlooked.

One problem is that the LCD's procedures do not appear robust enough to ensure that irrelevant or unsupported comments received from consultees are ignored.

The Lord Chancellor set up the commission with a fanfare in the wake of growing criticism.

His other changes to the system have clearly not gone far enough.

If he wants it to survive, the onus is now on Lord Irvine to respond properly.