The update includes notable developments and projects from the last six months and provides some insights drawn from the 2022 Diversity of the Judiciary statistical report. Recent highlights include:
- Analysis has shown that the support provided by the Targeted Outreach pilot programme has been impactful, with early signs of success for candidates in our target groups.
- Following the publication of the independent review into the operation of Statutory Consultation in March 2022, we launched a revised approach to Statutory Consultation from exercises launching in September 2022.
- In September 2022, we launched a Practice Qualifying Test tool on the JAC website to enable those applying for judicial roles to better prepare themselves for the appointment process.
- Since September 2021, we have monitored the ethnic diversity of panels for each selection exercise, considering both lay and judicial panel member resource. JAC data on the ethnic diversity of selection exercise panels was included in our Annual Report for the first time in 2022.
- We are continuing our research into the JAC Qualifying Test to provide further insight into the differential performance of underrepresented groups in legal exercises. We have taken action in response to the findings of phase one of the research and work has now begun on a qualitative second phase of the project, working in partnership with our Judicial Diversity Forum (JDF) partners.
- We have published a report following an international research project run by the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen) to consider measures used by other common law jurisdictions to improve judicial diversity.
The JAC Diversity Update is a biannual publication that reports on ongoing progress and new activity undertaken by the JAC in line with our diversity strategy. You can read the JAC’s previous Diversity Updates here.