Home > All articles  Your advertisement here   UK : Don't stop me now; Preparing for an ageing England’s population is ageing • Councils have a local area leadership role to ensure that older people can live independently and actively, with a good quality of life, for as long as possible. • As the population ages, the challenges and opportunities differ between areas; each council must lead an appropriate local response. • The ageing population will be increasingly diverse: stereotypes about older people are misleading, so councils need information about the diversity of their local people. • Older people - as citizens, volunteers, and service users - are an important resource for local action to tackle social isolation and support independent living. Most councils should do more to create an environment in which people thrive as they age • Central government’s Opportunity Age initiative to improve the quality of life of all older people has had limited impact. • Only a third of councils are well prepared for an ageing population, though a further third are making progress. • The vigour of local action by councils is often not determined by the extent of local need. • Older people experience councils as organisations that view them in terms of care needs, with little focus on diversity and opportunities. • All councils need to understand their older communities and shape both universal and targeted services accordingly. • Increased awareness, better engagement and innovation could help many older people without significant expenditure. All councils should work with older people to age-proof mainstream services • Councils need to engage with older people in commissioning, designing, and delivering both mainstream and targeted services. • Older people’s champions and representative boards can play an important role in assessing and evaluating the effect of local services on older people’s lives. • Councils can deliver significant benefits from age-proofing mainstream services, often at low cost. • Age-proofed mainstream services provide benefits for other members of the local community, including people with disabilities and parents with young children. • Marketing and promoting existing services to older people can increase takeup and support independent lives. • The best councils innovate to adapt mainstream services for older people and work with public and private sector partners to drive improvements. Councils should target services to tackle social isolation and support independent living • Targeted services should focus on the underlying causes of dependency in later life. • Councils should lead local statutory agencies and the community and voluntary sector in making the most effective use of local resources. • There are many older people ready and willing to contribute to community life: local authorities and their partners should mobilise this resource. Download the report     By KS Date 22-08-2008 Print this news| Send to a friend Your advertisement here