Accents are bar to profession

Cass Business School, part of City University, London, says research shows some elite law firms are bypassing well-qualified, white working-class candidates in favour of middle-class graduates from elite universities who they say are better for their image.

The five firms interviewed had rejected working-class students because their appearance or accent was not considered ‘smart’ enough and needed to preserve the ‘up-market brand’.

Dr Louise Ashley of the Centre for Professional Service Firms at Cass Business School, said that though the firms were publicly committed to diversity in the workplace almost all of their lawyers came from more privileged backgrounds, and at two of the firms more than 70 per cent of lawyers were privately educated.