Bealzebub,
The paragraph you have quoted is actually being used to argue the case for reducing increments and has very little to do with selection for opportunities.
There are no test cases for age discrimination yet but rest assured, they will come and there will be massive penalties for those companies that have chosen to ignore the legislation or put it on the back burner, as many have decided to do already.
Seniority is indirectly discriminative that, I'm afraid, is a cold fact as most of the people at the top of a seniority list are generally older than those at the bottom. It is therefore up to your company to prove there is no other way to carry out a fair selection and only then could they try to get an objective justification.
Lets not forget that this does not only affect command prospects, it also affects basing (if your company has more than one), fleet change, roster patterns and redundancy.
Last edited by Veethree; 22nd Jul 2006 at 19:17.