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last updated 21 August 2008

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see also news and opinion in the past 12 months


Elderly people suffering abuse and neglect in residential care homes (David Rose, The Times, 15 August 2008)

Elderly people are suffering from abuse, neglect and malnutrition in hospitals and care homes, according to a report by peers and MPs.
     The report, published today by the [House of Commons] Joint Committee on Human Rights, calls for changes in the law to safeguard the care of older people, and for a “complete change of culture” in health and care services.... [
story continues]


Over 50s could be losing out as hospitals discriminate on diseases and funding (David Rose, The Times, 15 August 2008) - hardcopy title: Hospitals accused of failing over-50s with poor care for common ailments

....Health experts found shortfalls in the quality of care offered to patients with conditions such as osteoarthritis, incontinence and osteoporosis.....
    The research, published in the British Medical Journal, found that the quality of healthcare for people with common health conditions “varied substantially by condition”.... [
story continues]

See BMJ 16 August 2008 (Vol 337, No 7666):

  Is choice working for patients in the English NHS?
  Gwyn Bevan
  BMJ  2008;337:a935 (Published 8 August 2008)
[Extract] [Full text] [Request Permissions]

Wine and fags make a good pension plan (Carol Midgley, The Times, 14 August 2008)

...everybody - absolutely everybody - dreads ending their days in a smelly, callous care home wearing someone else's false teeth. It's a definition of hell and an ever-looming spectre, yet we frequently push it away because it's too grotesque to contemplate....
     The Commission for Social Care Inspection this year produced a report that said hundreds of care and nursing homes were so poorly run that they were a danger to residents....
     I have friends who solemnly declare that their real “pension plan” is to drink themselves to death in a haze of tobacco and enjoy it. I see their point. The OAP days could be some of the happiest and most hedonistic of your life, free from the middle-age checklist of constantly having to be somewhere, doing something, answering to someone.... [
story continues]

How best to care for the elderly (Julia Neuberger, letter, The Times, 20 August 2008)

Sir, Carol Midgley (“Wine and fags make a good pension plan”, Opinion, Aug 14) rightly argues that it is amazing that more of us do not establish ourselves in communes for grown-ups when we get old, and care for each other — or, if necessary, buy in care together.

The US, Germany, the Netherlands and much of Scandinavia have just such schemes, called co-housing. There have been a few attempts to get this going in the UK, but none, as far as I am aware, have been successful.

We are not only sleepwalking into one in four of us needing long-term care in a care home, but also, all too often, denying ourselves, and, more significantly, our parents, much fun.

Can it really be that difficult to set up communes for older people, whether friends or not? And is it really beyond us to look at present provision and declare forcefully that it will not do?

Carol Midgley suggested wine and fags as our pension plan. Nothing wrong with that, but couldn’t we have a grey power movement as well that simply refuses to put up with much of what exists?


PRISONS ACCUSED OVER ELDERLY CARE (BBC News, 12 August 2008)

Prison bosses in England and Wales have failed to respond to a call to introduce special policies for elderly inmates, the prisons inspector says.
     Anne Owers said the response to her 2004 call had been disappointing.
     The number of inmates aged over 60 has been rising, but Ms Owers said their treatment was at odds with policies for the elderly in normal society.
     The [Ministry of Justice] National Offender Management Service [NOMS] said a national strategy for older inmates would not be appropriate.... [
story continues]

Older prisoners still face double punishment (Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, 13 August 2008)
Older prisoners a follow-up to the 2004 thematic review (June 2008)
Elderly Prisoners (Prison Reform Trust, 2006)


THERE'S A LOT TO BE SAID FOR AGEING DISGRACEFULLY (India Knight, The Sunday Times, 27 July 2008)


ESTELLE GETTY: ACTRESS ON US COMEDY THE GOLDEN GIRLS (The Times, 24 July 2008)

[Getty] was in her sixties before she became an international television star, as one of the four principals in the popular American sitcom The Golden Girls (1985-92).
     Uniquely, the series starred four elderly women and the storylines and jokes revolved around medical conditions and other aspects of ageing. Getty played the oldest of the four....
     Getty maintained, with some justification, that The Golden Girls [helped] to broaden Hollywood’s attitudes towards older people. “Before, every single older person was a mother or a grandmother. Now there are neighbours, secretaries and people who have jobs who are older people. You see roles they’ve never been allowed in before.”


OLD-TIME DANCING (Robert Crampton, The Times, 23 July 2008)

One way in which British society has indisputably improved is that you now see old people dancing as a matter of routine. Not just the formal ballroom dancing they learnt in the Stone Age (although I admire that as well) but proper get-on-down unselfconsciousness booty-shaking to classic disco and soul. I've been at four do's in the past few months, in the Vale of Glamorgan, in the West Country, in southern Spain and in the Gulf, where, as soon as the band or the DJ started up, the floor instantly filled with people of 50, 60, 70, 80-plus eager to cut some rug. An excellent development.


MORE SEX FOR TODAY'S SENIORS (New York Times, 22 July 2008)

The sex lives of senior citizens have improved markedly in the past three decades, according to a new study.

The data, published in The British Medical Journal, have been collected since the 1970s from 1,500 Swedish adults, all of whom were 70 years old at the time of the interview. Although the report is from Sweden, it mirrors recent research in the United States that show many people continue to have active sex lives well into old age.


DON'T STOP ME NOW: PREPARING FOR AN AGEING POPULATION (Audit Commission, 16 July 2008)

Abstract: This report looks at the challenges and opportunities facing England as its population gets older. It aims to help local public services adapt to the needs of an older and more diverse society, and identifies solutions that can be implemented quickly, as well as exploring how councils should plan strategically for the wider challenges ahead.

Audit Commission press release: Councils unprepared for England's ageing population

Councils 'unprepared' for elderly (BBC News, 17 July 2008)

Many English councils are not ready to deal with the impact of a rapidly ageing population, a watchdog has said.
     The Audit Commission found 27% of town halls failed to have a strategy other than for social care and almost half were only starting to develop ideas.
     Inquiries to councils from older people about leisure and other activities were often referred to social services when there was no need, the commission said... [story continues].


GIVING [sic] OLDER AND YOUNG PEOPLE A STRONGER VOICE (from Communites in control: real people, real power, Department of Communities and Local Government, White Paper, 9 July 2008)

from REPORT SUMMARY
35. It is important that older people can shape local services and in June 2008 the Government launched a
review of older people’s engagement with government.

from REPORT MAIN TEXT
Empowering older people

4.64 In an ageing society it is particularly important that older people are actively involved in shaping local services. In June 2008 the Department of Work and Pensions launched a
review of older people’s engagement with Government.70 This will examine the current arrangements for the engagement of older people and how these arrangements inform policy and actions of government at all levels. The review will report in the autumn. In addition, we will be refreshing our strategy for older people, Opportunity Age, over the coming months.71 Communities and Local Government’s recent 'Lifetime Homes, Lifetime Neighbourhoods' strategy highlighted how we would empower older people to live independently in their own homes for longer, creating more choice and control for people over their lives.72

70 See www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm/cmwms/archive/080522.htm#hddr_17

71 see www.dwp.gov.uk/opportunity_age/

72 Communities and Local Government (2008) Lifetime Homes, Lifetime Neighbourhoods: A National Strategy for housing in an ageing society. London: Communities and Local Government

review of older people's engagement with government - statement in the House of Commons

Older People (Engagement with Government)

Mike O'Brien (Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions; North Warwickshire, Labour) | Hansard source

I have asked John Elbourne, former chief executive, Prudential Assurance UK Operations to examine the current arrangements for the engagement of older people and the ability of those arrangements to inform policy and actions of Government at all levels. Specifically, this will include examining Better Government for Older People's: aims, structure and relationships; past achievements, lessons learned and best practice; lines of accountability, governance and reporting; and management arrangements, legal status and funding. He will explore options for improvement of engagement with older people in respect of the new Government performance framework and in relation to the roles of other organisations. He will then make recommendations to ensure that the findings of the review take full account of the expectations of older people, best support the independence and wellbeing of people in later life and ensure an effective and efficient process to serve these needs. (TheyWorkForYou.com, 22 May 2008)

 

See the DWP's Public Service Agreement 17 – ‘Tackle poverty and promote greater independence and wellbeing in later life’:

Public Service Agreements (PSAs) set out the key priority outcomes the Government wants to achieve in the next Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) period 2008–2011.

The Department for Work and Pensions leads on PSA 17 with major contributions from the Department of Health and Department for Communities and Local Government. It spans all policy and service areas and links closely to other PSAs notably Health, Care, Employment and Equalities.

Local Authorities have a key role in contributing to the success of PSA 17 through Local Area Agreements. Other local partners, such as Primary Care Trusts and voluntary and community groups, also have a significant contribution to make in partnership with Local Authorities.

PSA 17 brings together action across Government to tackle pensioner poverty and to ensure that we adapt to an ageing society by promoting greater independence and wellbeing in later life. The Public Service Agreement (PSA) 17 has five key indicators to assess progress over the three year Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) period 2008–2011:

  • the employment rate of those aged 50–69 and the difference between this and the overall employment rate
  • the percentage of pensioners in low income
  • healthy life expectancy at 65
  • satisfaction with home and neighbourhood among the over-65s
  • the extent to which older people receive the support they need to live independently at home

The PSA also outlines further reforms that the Government will take forward over the CSR period 2008–2011 to promote improvements in independence and well-being in later life, laying the foundations for adapting to an ageing society in the longer term. These include the pensions reforms set out in the Pensions White Paper 'Security in retirement: towards a new pension system'.


THE NATIONAL END OF LIFE CARE PROGRAMME (Department of Health, 9 July 2008)

"The Programme builds on the work of the NHS End of Life Care Programme, which ran from 2004-07. This SHA-led programme was supported by £12m investment, and was established to deliver on the commitment in Building on the Best to enable people at the end of life to have more choice about where they can be cared for, and die. Further information on the NHS End of Life Care Programme can be found at: End of Life Care Programme."

NHS told it must help patients to choose where and how to die Terminally ill will be urged to share their wishes (David Rose, The Times, 17 July 2008)
Promise may fit manifesto: will it meet the need? (Nigel Hawkes, The Times, 17 July 2008)
A Dying Refrain The Government is right to promote discussion on how we approach death, but our preference for dying at home may not always prove the best option (Leader, The Times, 17 July 2008)

Let's use death as a celebration of life - The Government's new end-of-life strategy is an opportunity to cast off our innate mawkishness (Valerie Grove, The Times, 17 July 2008)

Promise to improve care for dying (BBC News, 16 July 2008)

"People are to be given more choice over where they die as part of a package of measures to improve care for the dying.
     "Ministers are to outline the plans for England's first End of Life Care strategy, backed by £286m over three years....
     "[The Government's strategy] is being largely modelled on the Delivering Choice programme run by Marie Curie Cancer Care in six pilot areas."

Supporting the choice to die at home (Marie Curie Cancer Care campaign)


PENSIONERS "SEE HIGHER COST RISE" (BBC News, 5 July 2008)

"The cost of living for pensioners has outstripped inflation over the past 10 years, a study suggests.
  "Pensioners have seen the cost of the goods and services they use rise by 36% in the past decade,
said life insurer Clerical Medical [click to see press release].
  "However retail price inflation has risen by 32% in this time, it added." [
story continues]


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current conferences, consultations, meetings & other events


DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH
CONSULTATION ON STRATEGY FOR VOLUNTEERING IN HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE

 

The Department of Health is developing a strategy for Volunteering in Health and Social Care and has published a new consultation document, A Volunteering Strategy for Health and Social Care.

 

The Strategy will "articulate the key actions needed to address the perceived obstacles to making a refreshed vision for volunteering in health and social care a reality".

 

The consultation will run until 30 September 2008, with a view to publication of a final strategy and implementation plan in early 2009.

 

For a printed copy of the consultation document, email volunteeringstrategy@dh.gsi.gov.uk or tel. 0113 2545122.


British Society of Gerontology
37th Annual Conference
Sustainable futures in an ageing world
4–6 September 2008
hosted by the University of the West of England, Bristol and the University of Bristol

Featured speakers include:

-Miriam Bernard, Professor of Social Gerontology at Keele University

-Alex Kalache, former Director of the World Health Organization’s Ageing Program

-Professor Graham Rowles, Sanders-Brown Center on Aging, University of Kentucky

-Tony Benn will speak at the conference dinner

 

see website for registration and more information



UK Older People's Day 1 October 2008 (Directgov*)

 

Full of Life events (Directgov*)

 

* "Directgov is the website of the UK government providing information and online services for the public."


Royal National Institute for Deaf People
Sensory impairment - Quality of life for an ageing population

one-day seminar 2 October 2008 - 9.30am to 4.45pm
hosted at GlaxoSmithKline Research and Development, Gunnels Wood Road, Stevenage, Herts SG1 2NY

"The event is aimed at pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, funders and investors, senior academic researchers and government representatives. There will be approximately 150 people."


 

HOW IT'S DONE AILLEURS

 

"La parole est à vous!"

Public consultation on seniors' living conditions: 'Are you concerned about seniors' living conditions? I invite you to express your point of view' (Marguerite Blais, Minister responsible for Seniors, Québec, Canada). "The public consultation will focus, in particular, on: the financial situation of seniors; recognition of the contribution and needs of informal caregivers; seniors' contribution to society; home support; public and private seniors' homes. Visit the consultation's Website www.consultationpublique-aines.gouv.qc.ca."

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AGE DISCRIMINATION and AGEISM - see EQUALITIES

BBC NEWS - see also OPINION and PENSIONS
 - Call for fresh approach to falls (BBC News, 18 January 2008)

 - Over 50s 'fear fraud' on internet (17 December 2007)

BUS PASSES
 - Free bus passes cover all England (BBC News, 1 April 2008)
 - Arriva national bus concessions
-Arriva has added information to its homepage www.arrivabus.co.uk advising passengers about the changes, the benefits they bring and what customers need to do to ensure they have a free bus pass: "The changes to the scheme take effect on Tuesday, 1 April and ensure that anyone over 60 will now be entitled to concessionary bus travel from 9.30am to 11pm on Monday to Friday, and at any times on weekends and public holidays all across England.... (Arriva, 1 April 2008)

CABINET OFFICE: OFFICE OF THE THIRD SECTOR
 - see THE THIRD SECTOR

CARE & CARING
 
- Health and Social Care Bill 2007-08
"Summary of the Bill

"The Bill seeks to enhance professional regulation and create a new integrated regulator, the Care Quality Commission, for health and adult social care, with focus on providing assurance about the safety and quality of care for patients and service users.

"Key areas [excerpts]

 

  • Assures the safety and quality of care and creates a new regulator, the Care Quality Commission
  • Equips the new regulator with tougher powers, backed by fines, to inspect, investigate and intervene where hospitals are failing to meet hygiene standards....
  • Creates an independent adjudicator to undertake independent and objective formal adjudication for the professional regulatory bodies
  • Ensures that all healthcare organisations employing or contracting with doctors appoint a 'responsible officer' to work with the GMC to identify and handle cases of poor professional performance by doctors...". [excerpts and bold font in www.olderpeoplesweb.org.uk]

 - Commission for Social Care Inspection (CSCI) launches new quality ratings for care services (7 May 2008)
 - Sharp divide between people who do and do not qualify for social care (Commission for Social Care Inspection, 29 January 2008) - includes links to The State of Social Care in England 2006-07 (January 2008)
 - How the elderly and disabled are being left to fend for themselves (The Times, 30 January 2008)
 - Caring Choices: The Future of Care Funding (report published on 7 January 2008:
"More than 700 older people, carers and others were invited to share their experiences and views at our events throughout 2007. This final report, which draws on the evidence heard from these discussions, as well as a survey of those who attended the events and input from web visitors, will conclude the collaboration’s programme of work."
'Caring Choices: Who will pay for long-term care?' is a collaboration of 15 organisations representing all aspects of the long-term care system:

King’s Fund, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Help the Aged and Age Concern; in partnership with Alzheimer’s Society, Association of British Insurers, Association of Directors of Adult Social Services, Carers UK, Counsel and Care, English Community Care Association, Independent Age, Local Government Association, Royal College of Nursing, NHS Confederation and Social Care Institute for Excellence; also working with Age Concern Scotland, Elders Council of Newcastle, Help the Aged Scotland, Leeds Older People’s Forum and Race Equality Foundation.

 - We're sleepwalking into a crabbit old age What are we doing introducing more health screening to allow us to live even longer? (Valerie Grove, The Times, 11 January 2008)
 -
Putting the caring back into care homes (Women's Hour, BBC Radio 4, Thursday 10 January 2008), to which Ms Grove's article refers. The programme includes discussion with Amanda Waring about her video What do you see.
Ms Waring's video incorporates a popular poem attributed to a Phyllis McCormack, "Crabbit Old Woman" (often titled "Kate"). For the history of this poem, its transmission and reception see Judith Bornat, "Perspectives on Dementia Care" (5th Annual Conference on Mental Health and Older People, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK, 3 November 2005).
 - BBC Radio 4 You and Yours and Woman's Hour began a series on Care in the UK on Monday 7 January 2008 - see Care in the UK (BBC Radio 4)
 - Government drive to ensure 'every older person matters'
(Will Woodward, chief political correspondent, The Guardian, 5 January 2008) - includes report on interview with Ivan Lewis, Minister for Care: "Having revolutionised social care, Labour's new social justice frontier must be elderly care: strengthening support to the increasing number of family members caring for elderly relatives, and supporting older people to retain control over their own lives, with dignity at the heart of all care services.... This year will see the most radical shake-up of older people's services for a generation."
 - Standardised social care urged (BBC, 3 January 2008)

 - The trauma faced by stroke carers (BBC, 8 December 2007)
 - "The truth is, I just don't like her" (Lucy Johnson, The Times, 21 November 2007)

 - Who cares? (Stephen Martin, The Times, 21 November 2007)
 -
I resent her for still being alive - A reader describes her bitterness, anger and despair at having to care for her mother (The Times, 14 November 2007)

 

- see COUNSEL + CARE

CROWN PROSECUTION SERVICE
- Policy for Prosecuting Crimes Against the Older Person (draft consultation document, 7 November 2007; consultation now closed) and see Age Concern response to the draft consultation document and Gillian Connor, "Crime and older people" Magistrate (March 2008). Article placed on www.olderpeoplesweb.org.uk with permission of the author, Age Concern and Magistrate.

DEPARTMENT FOR COMMUNITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT (DCLG)
 - see EQUALITIES

DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH (DoH) - see HEALTH and CARE & CARING

DEPARTMENT FOR WORK AND PENSIONS (DWP) -
 - Older People (Engagement with Government)

Mike O'Brien (Minister of State, Department for Work and Pensions; North Warwickshire, Labour): I have asked John Elbourne, former chief executive, Prudential Assurance UK Operations to examine the current arrangements for the engagement of older people and the ability of those arrangements to inform policy and actions of Government at all levels. Specifically, this will include examining Better Government for Older People's: aims, structure and relationships; past achievements, lessons learned and best practice; lines of accountability, governance and reporting; and management arrangements, legal status and funding. He will explore options for improvement of engagement with older people in respect of the new Government performance framework and in relation to the roles of other organisations. He will then make recommendations to ensure that the findings of the review take full account of the expectations of older people, best support the independence and wellbeing of people in later life and ensure an effective and efficient process to serve these needs. (TheyWorkForYou.com, 22 May 2008) [Hansard source]

and see WORK and PENSIONS

ENGAGEMENT AND EMPOWERMENT
- Engagement and empowerment among older people in the South West of England: a case study (Evaluation Trust and South West Foundation, received May 2008): "about how Forums have developed in the South West, what sort of work they are doing and what kind of support they get" (Diane Aslett, Help the Aged)

EQUALITIES
FRAMEWORK FOR A FAIRER FUTURE - THE EQUALITY BILL (Government Equalities Office, 26 June 2008)

Chapter 2 - Ending age discrimination

It is wrong that people are treated in a discriminatory way because of their age. We have already banned unjustifiable age discrimination in the workplace. With the number of people aged over 85 set to double over the next two decades, we need to ensure that older people are treated fairly, have fulfilling lives and are able to play a full part in society.

  But there is a significant amount of evidence that older people are being treated in a discriminatory way by those providing goods and services, including health and social care. There are also concerns about restricted access to some financial services, such as insurance. Such treatment is not currently against the law.

  The Equality Bill will enable us to make it unlawful to discriminate against someone because of their age when providing goods, facilities and services or carrying out public functions.

  The new law will ban unjustifiable age discrimination against over-18 year olds. For example, a doctor failing to investigate a health complaint raised by an older person or not providing treatment simply because of their age; or retailers assuming that older people are incapable of signing a contract - for example for a mobile phone or loan - without a younger person present to explain the details.

  It will not affect the differential provision of products or services for older people where this is justified - for example free bus passes for over-60s and priority flu vaccinations for over-60s or group holidays for particular age groups or actuarially justifiable age-based treatment in areas such as financial services.

  The specifics of the new law will be set out in secondary legislation made under the Equality Bill. We will give service