'Hope I retire before I get old..." as The Who might have said had the proposed age discrimination law been on the cards when they penned My Generation back in 1965.

Those surviving band members, looking perhaps to make ends meet, could do worse than pop down to their local Sainsbury's in search of gainful employment, given that the supermarket chain announced last week that it intends filling 10,000 vacancies at its UK stores with "mature colleagues" - those aged over 50.

The Sainsbury's rationale is clear. The view - long held by B&Q, for example - is that older employees have more experience, behave more maturely and are more focused on customer service than school leavers and younger colleagues. In anticipation of the bar on age discrimination, which will come into force in October next year, Sainsbury's has established an age diversity policy that includes career breaks, the right to flexible working and "term-time" contracts.

So, is Sainsbury's jumping the discrimination gun? After October next year, it will be in almost all circumstances unlawful to recruit staff according to age, in the same way as it is currently prohibited to select employees according to their sex, race, sexual orientation or religion. Presumably, the same could be said of the supermarket's decision to place advertisements in media - such as the website www.fiftyon.co.uk, aimed specifically at older people.

The common perception of age discrimination is that it favours the young and that legislation is required to protect the interests of older people. That, for example, is the approach taken by federal law in the US which prohibits less favourable treatment of any employee over the age of 40. In contrast, the UK position from next year will be that people of all ages will be protected - to specify that employees must be "young and energetic", for example, will be as unlawful as to specify that they must be "mature".

* Stephen Elliott is a solicitor in the employment team of North-East law firm Ward Hadaway. He can be contacted on 0191-204 4000 or by email at stephen.elliott@wardhadaway.com

Published: 07/06/2005