The Spectator’s 48-year-old intern shows why it’s time to dispense with CVs

We at The Spectator don’t ask for CVs when recruiting interns so we had no idea that our last one of the summer, Katherine Forster, would be a 48-year-old mum-of-three from Yorkshire. Our aptitude test is intended to draw the most promising talent from anywhere. But her writing up her story for the magazine has caused a minor sensation. She has been on the BBC three times and has been the subject of the lead Evening Standard diary story and is interviewed in p23 of today’s Sunday Times (who took the above photo). She’s an inspiring person with a simple question: why, aged 48, shouldn’t she roll the dice again? If we’re all going to work until 70, that’s plenty time to learn a new trade. So for those asking why on earth she is interning at her age, she has another question: why on earth not?

I suspect that her story has such resonance because there is no good answer to this question.