Help the Aged and Age Concern demand urgent care cash boost

Help the Aged and Age Concern‘s first report as a merged charity today called for an urgent cash injection into older people’s social care.

The study, examining the state of older people’s lives in the UK, warned that a crisis in care services would deepen without more investment in preventive services and low-level care.

Personalisation

It emphasised that the personalisation of care and support services had so far failed to halt the decline in the number of older people offered low-level care packages.

The report also found nearly a quarter of older people believed their quality of life had deteriorated over the past year and 52% thought service planners paid too little attention to them.

Indicators going backwards

An analysis by the charity of 35 indicators to track progress on issues affecting older people found just four showed improvement and 13 had worsened.

These included a decrease in the number of people receiving low-level home care and an increase in hospital emergency readmissions for the over-75s.

Two million in poverty

One in five pensioners – the equivalent of more than two million people – was found to be living below the poverty line.

And 68% of older people believed that politicians viewed older people as a low priority, while one in 10 said they were often or always lonely.

Care and support system ‘on brink of collapse’

Publishing the findings this week, Michelle Mitchell, charity director for Age Concern and Help the Aged, said: “Attitudes to older people are stuck in the past, the care and support system for older people is on the brink of collapse and older people’s experiences of isolation and exclusion have largely been ignored by successive governments.”

The merged charity, which was formally launched on 1 April, has a combined income of more than £150m and is developing a new name and brand identity.

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