... the school had rather a family atmosphere and (I think) a low chop rate. For all that, there was one student whom we all wanted to chop. The student in question was a bit of a BS merchant, did not seem to be listening to instruction (we most of us flew with him) and failed the odd check ride. He seemed to have natural ability. He was at least once trailled by an instructor because we suspected he was wasting or misusing his solo sorties. My own view was he was actually something of a psychopath. The nub of the problem was one of Personal Qualities. We agreed that we could not see him as a responsible aircraft captain; we saw him as bound to be the death of someone in due course and we feared that someone might not even be him.
With the doctrine at the time, we could not chop him from training.
Further to my post #36, by sheer coincidence an old pilot friend came to stay with us a day or two ago. Unasked he came out with virtually the same story.
It turns out he was the instructor of the student we wanted to chop. It was he who trailled the student on one of his solo sorties.
If we were sure the student was doomed, we were wrong in so far as that my friend believes he retired as a 747 captain. We still think he should have been chopped.
Maybe, as we finally recommended, his RAF career was always as a co-pilot. Otherwise his latent irresponsibility was an unnecessary risk to the Service.