Fair Incomes and Affordable Housing for Older People
(Photo by Marty Melville/Getty Images)
The economic wellbeing of older people, is crucial says Age Concern. Three out of five older people rely almost completely on NZ Super for their income with little or no savings or other income. That means that what happens with NZ Super is a central issue. Grey Power is totally opposed to the National Government’s policy to raise the age of entitlement to 67
The housing crisis is affecting older people also and access to affordable rental housing for older people that is of good quality and where they can stay long term is another crucial issue for Grey Power and Age Concern.
Age-Friendly Communities that embrace diversity and challenge stereotypes of ageing
The Age-Friendly Communities movement means government policies that help towns and cities around the country to better adapt their structures and services to meet the needs of older people. This includes the buildings and public amenities, transport, communication civic participation, as well as the issues of health, social services, and community support services.
Funding for Services
Meeting the challenge of an ageing society means also better for the health, social and community services that underpin wellbeing for people as they age. Home based support and aged residential care need to be funded better as not-for-profit, smaller and regional service providers struggle to meet the growing need.
Better funding is urgently needed for social support services to overcome isolation, better primary health services and funding for elective surgery are all part of the picture to help reduce need for other, more costly hospital and acute emergency services.
Dementia Challenge is a special one
The number of people living with dementia is expected to triple to 170,000 over the next 30 years. So Alzheimers NZ has put the hard questions to political parties about how they plan to meet the challenge of increasing need for dementia support services as our population ages. Their three key asks:
- Fully fund Dementia Navigation as outlined in the Framework
- Provide post-diagnostic support services for a minimum of 12 months
- Provide high quality information resources