Surely that's just discriminating between people simply looking at when they started playing? Also, as much as it's good that the staff are discussing this and listening to the community (better than a lot of other similar servers), this rule still isn't good in my opinion.
The old system of deranking after a permaban was great for 2 reasons: firstly it gave people a chance to reform, and secondly because it took false bans into account. They happen no matter how good the staff team is, and there will be a handful of players who have never done anything wrong who cannot play on the leaderboards.
Just a final point: I don't think many people who hack really do it for their leaderboard rank, so I don't think it would be effective as a deterrent.