A senior lawyer has offered his support to the Bar Council's stand that judges should be promoted based on seniority.

Karpal Singh, who is also a leader of the opposition DAP, lamented that seniority was no longer a criteria for promotion of judges in the judiciary which was the case right up to the 70s.

"Leap-frogging should be eliminated as this certainly points towards a lack of transparency... Disrespect for seniority reflected in promotions only leads to deterioration in the quality of performance of judges who are, after all, human," he said.

Karpal urged for the return to the convention of seniority as the mainstay for judicial promotion.