As an aspiring parliamentary candidate I applied for a number of constituencies before Portsmouth North selected me. During the interview process and before the ‘ordeal by sherry’ came the grilling by the great and the good of the local Conservative Association.
One classic question (for most of which any sensible candidate would have prepared stock answers) was: ‘Which cabinet job would you most want, and why?’ It was clearly a deliberate trap to categorise you either as an egomaniac or a wet blanket, and I sought to avoid both with the response that I aspired to be the last ever Chancellor of the Exchequer.
My explanation for such an unusual answer was that the Chancellor should be the head of an effective finance department rather than someone who meddles manically in high-spending departments as, at the time in 2003, Gordon Brown had turned into an art form.
It seemed to me then – and still does – that unless the Treasury becomes a force for good (by helping departments to do things better; to maximise return on expenditure; and/or facilitate better services) then it should stop its incessant interfering.aa
By contrast I believe that the Treasury – in the right hands and given a proper remit – could do much good to effect change for the better across Whitehall.
Today one such opportunity presents itself. This morning the Grey Pride campaign will deliver a petition with 140,000 signatures to Downing Street which asks for a minister for older people.
In my opinion this should not be another name on the government payroll, but a new responsibility allocated to a minister already enjoying the view both from the Treasury panopticon and also from sitting around the Cabinet table. Although at first sight this seems no better than the next in a line of exhausted gimmick policies (such as government tsars) on closer inspection it makes perfect sense.
We have an ageing population and almost all government departments have responsibility for some element of older people’s lives: and yet there is often no inter-departmental (or even intra-departmental) consideration of how older people are affected by government policy. Someone should take charge of this: and it should be someone important.
For despite their greater propensity to vote, older people have been the most poorly served by successive governments. There is more to serving our older generations than benefit increases, especially ones they do not know how to access. The vast majority of unmet need in our communities is among older people, thousands of whom require access to basic services from dementia care to bathing to social contact.
In Portsmouth, the city I represent, 1,000 such people are known to exist today: but the council has only budgeted for an extra 200 adult social care clients over the next five years. We have had reports from the Care Quality Commission on hospital care; from the EHRC on domiciliary care; and from the Centre for Social Justice on the quality of life for older people: and all of these concluded that there is too much poor practice and too little compassion.
Local government has not protected budgets for older people; it has not been focussed on unmet need; and it has not been smart about advising people to pre-empt the exhaustion of older people’s assets by helping them to plan for the costs of care. On the other side of the coin, national government has repeatedly kicked older people’s health and care into the long grass while throwing money at a bureaucratic and expensive welfare system.
But it’s not just in these more obvious areas that older people are disadvantaged. Take, for example the everyday frustrations of ordinary businesses applying for credit in these straitened times. Then imagine how much more difficult it is for a grey entrepreneur with a brilliant idea for a second career but who encounters ageism from the local bank manager. Or the couple who want to downsize their home to have a better quality of life only to find this would require them to rehouse their dog and to live in a box room. Or the older person who is active and mobile but can no longer make use of public transport for the lack of somewhere to sit down, or access to a loo.
Meeting older people’s unmet need and improving the quality of all services in each of these areas will benefit not just today’s senior citizens: it would make a contribution to getting UK plc back on its feet; it would lessen the burden on the public purse; and lighten the load for younger generations, too.
So while I appreciate that the Chancellor has quite enough on his plate at present, I think that the Chief Secretary (who is a Treasury minister also of Cabinet rank) should additionally assume the role of minister for older people. It is, perhaps, even more appropriate since he is responsible for departmental budgets across the government.
He might relish the savings for the National Health Service from a reduction to hospital admissions and bed-blocking; the increase in capital mobility through targeted equity release schemes; and the substantial additional tax receipts from successful older workers.
We are used to hearing about sending for the men in grey suits but now is the time for the government to listen more closely to the people with grey (or greying) hair; and there is a delicious irony in the fact that Danny Alexander (the current Chief Secretary) is both the youngest cabinet minister and certainly the least grey-headed.
So I welcome and heartily support the Grey Pride campaign: and, during the upcoming parliamentary boundary review, I shall have another answer to that stock question for my next selection panel!
Penny Mordaunt is the Conservative MP for Portsmouth North. More details of the Grey Pride campaign can be found at greypride.org.uk
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