Limiting student numbers on the bar vocational course (BVC) and requiring students to have a 2:1 will not improve quality or diversity among barristers, the Bar Standards Board (BSB) has warned.


Responding to the interim recommendations of the Bar Council's entry to the bar working group, which expressed concern about an 'over-supply' of students, the bar's regulatory arm said that while there was nothing to suggest that competition for places and costs were putting students off, it was crucial that students were aware of the risks of taking the course.



On that basis, it is 'difficult to understand how it would be appropriate to seek to limit numbers'. There would need to be evidence that the rise in numbers was reducing the quality of entrants or training, it said.



It added: 'The fact that relatively few people gain pupillage with less than a 2:1 degree may be a feature of a crowded market or inadequate recruitment procedures by chambers, rather than evidence that objectively they are not capable of doing the work.'



Catherine Baksi