JUST last month [September 2013], six British charities – including Age UK – formed an alliance to urge all political parties to recognise, and act upon, the challenges of an ageing population. The resulting Ready for Ageing Alliance immediately launched a public debate in London. That debate is now considering how the government should respond to the UK’s ageing society.
At last, some action is being taken.
But what prompted the creation of the Ready for Ageing Alliance in the first
place? According to a number of media
sources, the Alliance was formed in response to a report published in August by
parliament’s Public Service and Demographic Change Committee. The contents of
that report made it clear that all political parties must take action now, or
risk a crisis in the future.
Indeed, the Committee’s Chairman Lord
Filkin stated, “Health and social care need to be
radically reformed; both are failing older people now. A big shift in services
is essential so that the many more older people with long-term conditions can
be well cared for and supported in their own homes and in the community, and
not needlessly end-up in hospital. All health services and social care must be
integrated to help achieve this.”
Lord
Filkin then went-on to say, “This is not a distant issue. Our population is
older now and will get more so over the next decade. The public are entitled to
an honest conversation about the implications.” In addition to Lord Filkin’s comments,
the committee’s report accused the government of “woeful unpreparedness” in
relation to the UK’s ageing society.
While
applauding the above-mentioned developments, I nevertheless feel compelled to
ask the parliamentary committee and charities concerned one simple question.
Why on earth has it taken such a very long time for these observations about
our ageing society to come to the fore?
Allow me
to explain the reasons behind my query: following the end of World War II, the
government of the time made it clear that Britain needed to urgently restore
its population to pre-war levels. That announcement coincided with the arrival
home of many thousands of military personnel who’d served overseas through the
war years. Suffice it to say significant numbers of them married soon after
their return. Result? The Post War Bulge generation … the original Baby Boomers
… who became the single biggest generation Britain has ever produced.
In 1948,
soon after the first flush of Baby Boomers had arrived, the National Health
Service was launched, thus improving universal health care overnight. In the
years that followed, a wider – and more nourishing – variety of fruit and
vegetables became more readily available to the public at large. That was
followed, in turn, by the influx of immigrants from Commonwealth nations, many
of whom brought with them their young children of Baby Boomer age.
By the
mid-1950s, despite the lingering austerity and very large classroom sizes, the
general health and longevity of Britain’s population had begun to improve,
thanks in part to the success of the NHS and our healthier dietary habits and
life styles. In some ways, those improvements have not only been maintained,
but they have also been built-upon ever since. However, there is one notable
exception to those improvements: the care of the elderly.
So,
instead of blaming today’s government for their “woeful unpreparedness”, shouldn’t
Lord Firkin and his committee have pointed-out that the situation we UK
pensioners find ourselves in today is due entirely to a shameful lack for
foresight on the part of successive governments and politicians in general
since the early 1950s?
Over that
same period, charities for the elderly have, almost certainly, been trying to
awaken the powers-that-be to the dangers of ignoring one obvious fact: that the
Baby Boomers would all be arriving at pensionable age in the early years of the
21st Century. Clearly their warnings have been falling on deaf ears
for a very long time. Hence the mess we’re in today.
