MORE CAREER ACCESS

Your recent editorial asked who uses the Legal 500.

The answer was provided several weeks earlier by the article 'Generation Gap' (see [2001] Gazette, 23 August, 30), which described how a female candidate who knew little about a career in law was able to make a wise and informed choice with its help.I was not so fortunate as this woman.

Like her, I come from a background where there was little knowledge of careers in law.

Unlike her, I began my training about a year before the Legal 500 was published.

I hoped to train in commercial law, but to my frustration and bewilderment found myself facing a wall of silence.There were no publications providing information on this subject and my university careers adviser was unable to give guidance.The result was that I made a bad choice of firm with which to train.

I soon realised my mistake and moved on immediately after completing articles.

Just how poor my choice had been became evident when I later became redundant.

I was unable to gain another position because employers only considered those who had trained with major commercial firms - and the firm that I had trained with was not one of those.

I am still unable to find anything other than temporary employment.

It is almost certain that I will never achieve the sort of legal career that I would have hoped for.Your 'Generation Gap' article appears (quite rightly) to disapprove of the 'old pals' act' as practised by Oxford and Cambridge colleges (which, incidentally, were all male until 1979).

Yet, the absence of other, openly accessible information on careers in law encouraged this system to flourish.The Gazette has often stated that aspiring lawyers, particularly those from less privileged backgrounds, should have as free and open access to legal careers as possible.

Yet information on potential employers that is openly accessible to all candidates is a vital ingredient of such freedom of choice.Claire Jones, Hassocks, West Sussex