The National Pensioners’ Convention (NPC) is calling on our newly elected government to urgently prioritise a strategy for the UK’s rapidly ageing population.
A fifth of people in the UK are now over 65 and within two decades that will rise to one in four, or a quarter of the entire country.
But while more of us are living longer, our healthy life expectancy is plummeting, exacerbated by our struggling health and care services.
And more of us, 2.1 million to date, are living in poverty.
Despite their welcome pre-election promises to protect the triple lock on state pension increases, and to start to establish a desperately needed National Health Care Service, the NPC is concerned that the problems of the older population are not high on their priorities.
The secretary of the NPC Jan Shortt said: “Older people were largely invisible in the pre-election debates on the party manifestos.
“So, the NPC will be looking carefully at how the new government engages with older people on their promises and whether they are open to working on a 360-degree strategy for ageing well, particularly through an independent Commissioner for Older People and Ageing in England, as they have in Wales, and Northern Ireland.
“We hope to be able to work with the new government on this issue, and many others, including free social care for the one in five of us, 13 million, now over 65 who are increasingly living in poor health.
“Over and above all this is the issue of the push to digital across all areas of our lives, from banking to the NHS, and travel to shopping, this is leaving our ageing population dangerously behind.”
Even maintaining the triple lock, while this is welcome, is not going to be enough to help the millions of older people who are going to increasingly require complex health and social care provision in future.
I hope the new government considers this when they look at the care needs of the one in four of us, a quarter of the population, who will be 65 within two decades.
The recent election results mean we have a real chance for change, but change won’t happen with this election alone, it will come in the coming days, weeks and years.
Rodney Sadd
Crowland
