UNITED NATIONS WORLD ASSEMBLY ON AGEING 2002

By Tony Carter

The Assembly, and the associated voluntary sector Forum, was an exciting and stimulating occasion. It is always interesting to discuss matters of common concern with older people (and others involved) from another country. To be able to do so with colleagues from China, Ghana, Ukraine, Denmark, USA … within the space of a few hours was a rich experience. There was a diversity of problems and ways of looking at them but also a great deal in common. Being able to look at many of the issues of concern to older people against this background has provided new insights, new ideas and new thoughts of how to advance the cause of older people; these will work through over the next few months.

It is important that the voluntary and not-for-profit sectors play a significant role at international levels, with the United Nations and other global organisations; it was encouraging to learn of the several ways in which this is done. I think this is not well known; it should be.

There was a sizeable number of older people present and they took a very full part, including a dozen from Britain, in the delegations of the Government, National Pensioners' Convention, Older Women's Network, Better Government for Older People and Help the Aged. It is not too long ago that at an event discussing ageing matters, comparatively few older people themselves would have been present. Over all, about 60% of people present were women, probably another change since the last World Assembly on Ageing, 20 years ago.

The subjects discussed, both in and out of the formal sessions, were many and various. Here's a note about some of those that seemed important to me.

Poverty

At several sessions, the issue of poverty among older people came to the fore. This was mainly among developing countries but not exclusively so. Pensioners in Argentina, for instance, are suffering greatly because of the economic disaster there; in Eastern European countries pensioners barely manage to exist. Even Western European countries and the USA had stories to tell of considerable hardships. Poverty is not merely a question of maintaining life. Nana Apt, from Ghana, pointed out that 'poverty equals marginalisation and exclusion'.

Debated hotly was the role of the IMF and the World Bank, both organisations which have recently started to take an interest in poverty in developing countries. Some welcomed this late conversion and were willing to work with it; others criticised strongly institutions which were, as they saw it, prime authors of their condition because of the debt burden. I discussed this with the General Secretary of the Organisation of African Trade Union Unity; he was clear that the World Bank and the IMF were the enemy.

Speakers from several countries praised the very significant role of the UK-based HelpAge International. This work could usefully be better publicised in Britain. At a meeting with UK Minister Ian McCartney, he demonstrated a welcome interest in this work.

Pensions

The pensions debate was very much to the fore. Speaker after speaker advanced the view that because more people are living longer, allied to falling fertility, countries face severe economic problems in looking after their elderly. Possible solutions canvassed included raising retirement age, reducing benefits, forcing more private provision for old age, getting more 50+ people back to work. Unsurprisingly, not everyone agreed, suggesting that, for many, increasing the years spent in work would be unfair and possibly harmful. Productivity increases should provide enough continuing national wealth to maintain adequate social security systems.

The debate will continue in Britain as elsewhere. Those of us who have already retired have an obvious interest but the main input should come from those who will be tomorrow's pensioners. A speaker from the World Bank (an unlikely source, one might suppose!) suggested these issues around retirement should be included in trade unions' bargaining agenda.

Participation

This occupied more attention than I should have guessed, with great interest not only from the developed nations but also the developing. The feeling that older people had a right to participate in the decisions that affect them ran strongly. A number of sessions also stressed the importance of older people's organisations and that these should be actively encouraged.

British delegates hosted a session on older people's involvement in policy making. The keynote speaker spoke of the history of involvement in our country, the pioneer work done by the National Pensioners' Convention, now also taken up by Help the Aged's Speaking Up for Our Age programme and Better Government for Older People. BGOP director Mervyn Eastman told an interested audience of continuing work and British pensioner Shu Pao Lim outlined participative work with Chinese elders.

Health

Foreseeably, this was a major issue for all countries. Important issues were -
- the terrible problems of HIV and Aids for many countries
- the universal acceptance of the importance of preventive health measures for older people
- in many countries, a major problem was actually reaching a health facility;
throughout the world, transport is a health issue.
It was clear that some countries have the UK system of separate health and social care, in others it was unified. I got the impression that the latter worked better (although that may only reflect my own views).

Participation was a significant strand here as well, with British pensioners Peggy
Sandford and Shu Pao Lim speaking about the UK National Service Framework for Older People and how older people had been closely involved in drawing it up.

Active Ageing

This has become a catch phrase; as one delegate pointed out, the task is to implement it. As a concept, it includes many of the things that concern us in the UK - age discrimination, health prevention measures, culture, life long learning. All were discussed. As in the UK, many countries seemed to suppose that life long learning stopped at retirement. Some (including, forcefully, China) made the point that 'life long' means precisely that.

Other issues

Many other important issues were discussed. They included housing, elder abuse, human rights and older people, the arts and older people, inter-generational and family relationships.

Discrimination against women was an issue debated in a session led by the very lively Women's Sub committee of the US Gray Panthers; they, and another session led by American ARP, demonstrated that US pensioners have made lobbying into a fine art.

Almost all the sessions lifted the debate to significantly higher levels. Attending this assembly was altogether an enriching experience. It left me more than ever convinced we must work with pensioners in other countries.

I certainly learned from them and hope our experiences may be useful elsewhere.



Tony Carter
29 April 2002