The fact that just 18% of TV presenters are female has this week drawn the attention of Harriet Harman MP, the Shadow Culture Secretary and Chair of Labour’s Older Women’s Commission. [1] On Thursday, senior executives in the TV industry will be asked to explain to the Commission why there are so few female television presenters. Continue reading
Older women in work: think outside the box
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Older people stay connected…and stay at home
FINDINGS 1: FINANCIAL DIMENSIONS OF WELLBEING IN OLD AGE
The collaboration between ILC-UK and the Personal Finance Research Centre (funded by the ESRC) is starting to produce its first results. The project, looking at financial dimensions of wellbeing in older age, began in earnest earlier this year and we have already had papers accepted at several international conferences over the next few months. This is the first of a series of blogs to highlight emerging findings from the research. Continue reading
Older and disabled people worried by cost and complexity of energy saving schemes
Focus groups carried out by National Energy Action – a charity funded by the Department for Energy and Climate Change – have found that older and disabled people are being put off the government’s flagship energy efficiency programmes by fears over their complexity and cost.
The results of the focus groups, conducted in March, were printed in today’s Guardian [1] via a freedom of information request. The groups set out to establish what the likely uptake of both the Green Deal and the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) scheme would be amongst “older people, families and households with disabilities and long-term health conditions”. Continue reading
NHS launches roll-out of shingles vaccination for older people
Today the Government announced that all adults between the ages of 70-79 would be entitled to a herpes zoster vaccination, to immunise against shingles. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation initially issued the recommendation in January 2010, basing their judgement on the result of comprehensive analysis of epidemiological, medical and economic evidence [1]. Continue reading
Live blog: ‘Public Service and Demographic Change’ – an ILC-UK and Actuarial Profession joint debate, supported by JRF
This is the live blog for the ILC-UK and Actuarial Profession joint debate ‘Public Service and Demographic Change’ supported by Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
Blogging for this event will begin at 16.15 on Tuesday 23 April. If you would like to receive a notification prior to the start of the event, please sign up here or in the box below.
Agenda
16:30 – 16:35
Welcome by Chair
16:35 -17:15
Presentation from:
Lord Filkin (Chair, the House of Lords Public Service and Demographic Change committee)
17:15 – 18:25
Panel Discussion/Q&A
Justin Russell (Director – Ageing Society and State Pensions, Department for Work and Pensions)
David Sinclair (Assistant Director, Policy and Communications, ILC-UK)
Claire Turner (Head of Ageing Society Team, Joseph Rowntree Foundation)
Deborah Cooper (The Actuarial Profession)
18:25 – 18:30
Close by Chair
You can find further details of this event on our Events page, along with the presentation slides. Continue reading
Guest blog: Lorna Warren – From Look Me In The Eye to Look At Me!: Representations of Gender and Ageing
This blog is one in a series on gender and ageing, part of a wider stream of work including a Compendium of Essays on the theme ‘Has the Sisterhood forgotten older women?’, launched on International Women’s Day. ILC-UK is establishing an Older Women’s Policy and Research Action Alliance with the aim of creating a roadmap for future research and policy priorities. If you would be interested in being involved, please email info@ilcuk.org.uk
I was 22 and in the first year of my PhD when I stumbled upon the book Look Me In The Eye.[1] I’d gone to Manchester’s independent bookshop, Grassroots, in search of holiday reading. Barbara Macdonald’s uncompromising front-cover stare stopped me in my tracks before I could reach the fiction section. Her collection of essays, with contributions by her partner Cynthia Rich, was on ‘old women, ageing and ageism’ (1984). It was radically different from the texts that had so far informed my developing thesis on social care provision for older people. Continue reading
Guest blog: Claire Turner – Ready for Ageing? It is not just age that matters
In public and political debates on ageing, chronological age features heavily with statistics abound on the growing ageing population. But age is only part of the picture. A number of other factors impact on the way we age and how able we are to plan and prepare for ageing; most notably wealth and health.
As part of a broad, long-term look at the preparedness of both Government and individuals for an ageing population, the recent House of Lords report Ready for Ageing(1) considers the issues of fairness and equality both within and between generations. Continue reading
ILC-The Netherlands Blog: A Longer Working Life?
Younger and older employees have much in common. They are devoted to their work; most of them are capable and usually see their work as meaningful. So it’s very strange that employers and employees, the younger as well as the older generation, think that younger employees outperform older ones. Despite an enormous amount of scientific evidence of the opposite, century old prejudices still prevail in our modern society. In view of the rapid aging of the workforce in most industrialized developed countries in the next ten years, these prejudices are a huge restraint to economic growth. To change these prejudices would require a fundamental cultural overhaul, which would probably take several generations. Continue reading
Guest blog: Dr Linda Thomson and Dr Helen Chaterjee – The role of museum object encounters in a heritage-focused intervention with older women in hospitals and residential care
This blog is one in a series on gender and ageing, part of a wider stream of work including a Compendium of Essays on the theme ‘Has the Sisterhood forgotten older women?’, launched on International Women’s Day. ILC-UK is establishing an Older Women’s Policy and Research Action Alliance with the aim of creating a roadmap for future research and policy priorities. If you would be interested in being involved, please email info@ilcuk.org.uk
Museum objects hold a special importance for many people. They function as symbols of identity, relationships, nature, society and religion. Continue reading
Guest blog: Charles Musselwhite – Beyond the car: Don’t forget the discretionary travel needs of an ageing population
The recent House of Lords’ report from the Select Committee on Public Service and Demographic Change, Ready for Ageing, is a timely reminder of the importance of transport, travel and mobility in later life. The House of Lords report notes the importance of taking into account the needs of older people when planning transport (paragraph 279), but, I wonder, do we know what these needs are?