older women - an article

I am not sure this is part of the memoir, but it gives a bit more detail of work with the older women's project.

When I was 59 I decided to change career from being a journalist to becoming a community worker and I found a job in Camden working with older people. Part of my job was to give support to the Camden Pensioners Action Group where I soon noticed that although at least 80% of the members were women, guess who held all the positions of power in the group? Yes, men. So, with the support of my team and central office, I set about getting funding from the GLC to set up an older women's project, which is now, 11 years later, still flourishing and called AGLOW, the Association of Greater London Older Women. We are still only funded to work in London. In Britain as a whole there are 7 million women aged over 60, 7 million citizens who have been rendered iinvisible and whose voices have been silenced by the ageism and sexism in our society. The contribution made by older women to the economy through their unpaid work in the home, as childminders within the extended family, as volunteers staffing charities, as the carers and good neighbours, goes unrecognised. Our society devalues age, it devalues women once they are past child-bearing, child-rearing days. This combination of ageism and sexism means that little heed is paid to older women, low priority is given to their needs and too little research is done into the specific issues that affect their lives. Is it any wonder then that they also suffer low self-esteem and have low expectations when they have been so marginalised? Especially when you learn that only 17% of women retire on a full basic state pension, 80% of all lone women over 60 live in poverty, 60% over 65 have a long-standing illness or disability and around 700,000 people over 65 suffer from dementia, the vase majority of them being women. The women now aged 70 are of a generation that suffered from the negative social attitudes towards the education of women. Many of them left school at 14 and they feel the lack of education has rendered them powerless. The empowerment of disadvantaged older women is one of the main aims of AGLOW. In the workshops that we organise, older women share their experiences, explore their personal and collective needs and determine action to take to fulfill them. We try to increase their confidence. Last year we convened an older women's conference on Community Care and around 80 women shared their experiences as users. One of their main conclusions was that there is a need for more information. Whilst information is available it does not seem to reach the eople who need it most, and information is the key to proper choice. The complexity of the assessment process for Community Car worries them too and especially the questions about their finances. Older people have bad memories of means testing. But most complaints were about the charges for services now. They are finding some of the services they need are too expensive. Chiropody and eye tests are examples. Because of this, certain eye problems, like glaucoma, are not being picked up. They are also concerned about those with mental health problems. Older women are rarely given access to "talking treatments", psychotherapy groups and counselling. They find themselves fobbed off with tranquilisers and anti-depressants. Through AGLOW we have set up some self-help support groups for older women suffering depression. But the awful reality is that more older women are becoming drinkers and are sleeping rough in the streets.
Everyone wanted more information on the complaints procedure and it was stressed that some older people worry about complaining, so they need advocates. A complaint we often hear is that people from black and ethnic minority communities are still not getting culturally appropriate forms of support in many areas, and lesbians are discriminated against in residential homes. The high cost of nursing homes is also a real worry and the fear that they will have to sell their homes and have nothing to leave for their family. [It is ironic that Zelda herself had to sell her home to pay for care and that nearly all the money she had went to the pockets of shareholders in a private care provider!]
User involvement in decision making is always a point of issue. Whilst attempts have been made, user involvement remains more in the wish than in the reality. The users should be involved in the monitoring of services. On housing, the important points raised were the long waits for transfer, the need for more emergency housing for sufferers of violence, because the incidence of elser abuse is very high. There is also the need to carefully monitor conditions in residential homes. And for women to be able to stay in their own homes, they need help with repairs, decoration, odd jobs, window cleaning and gardening. Transport availability and the continuation of the free travel pass are also very important issues for older women.
After that conference, AGLOW arranged a meeting of around 40 of the women to meet women MPs in a committee room of the House of Commons to discuss their concerns. We have also spoken separately to Clare Short. Now that Tessa Jowell has taken over from Clare Short we are arranging another meeting with her at the House in December to lobby for legislation against age discrimination. [Clare Short and Tessa Jowell were both ministers in the 1997 labour government - RIP!] This is blatant in the NHS with operations, screenings and treatment being denied to older women. The ongoing work that AGLOW does is to run courses on assetiveness, self-defence, computer courses and How to produce a newsetter. But we're not all work and no play - we also have had drama sessions, drumming classes, belly-dancing, keep fit and reminiscence workshops. We want women to be able to live life to the full, to fulfill their otential. Towards this aim, AGLOW also works with the Older Women's Education Group. We organise 3 or 4 study days in a year and the most recent one was on relationships. We have also taken ourselves into Europe for campaigning through the Older Women's Network, Europe, which was set up last summer. Through that we sent a representative to Beijing for the International Women's Meeting.

[I think Zelda was about 73 when she wrote this. Being 64 myself now, it is interesting to see if anything has changed for older women. I think many things have, but there is still the looming problem of care in later life, and whether the services will be there and be affordable - especially as in the UK our government is determined to turn back the clock of the national health service to 1945!]