Emma Soames People who are very broadly aged from 50-70 represent a massive resource that this – and other countries – need to tap into. Endowed with experience and blessed with better health and longer lives, we have the capacity to be the nation’s greatest source of volunteers, of mentors and of social entrepreneurs.
We are the holders of a huge reservoir of collective wisdom. You are probably truly frustrated about the lack of opportunities to exploit your skill and experience somewhere other than shelf stacking at the local B&Q. Just as adolescence was only recognised as a life stage in 1904, now, more than a century later, this stage has been identified and named by Saga’s own Director-General, Ros Altmann, who calls this phase of life "bonus years".
At a recent event organised by NESTA, the leading thinkers in innovation, I heard an American social entrepreneur, Marc Freedman, call us the oxymoronic generation.
“We are the young old, the working retired and it is a stage, not an age,” he explained. He pointed out that this stage of our life could be as long as our mid life when we worked (in the career sense) and raised our children.
This is the time for what Freedman calls “an encore career” when we exploit what could previously been a hinterland. Freedman’s own CV demonstrates exactly this. He has founded Civic Ventures, a national nonprofit organisation that works to expand the contributions of older Americans to society and he tours the world talking a great deal of inspired good sense. He also instigated the Purpose Prize which recognises the achievements of social entrepreneurs aged over 60.
Recent winners include a psychiatrist who has set up a free counselling network for army veterans, thousands of whom find their return home poisoned by their war experiences. Judith Broder, 70, has franchised the scheme and now it operates in five American states where it is transforming lives and allowing soldiers to truly "come home".
If we believe, like Freedman that we are what survives of us, then this is the time of life to create our legacy. Some of the best ideas and breakthroughs come from older people who have the time and experience to see how things can be done differently or how a vacuum of need can be filled.
Despite draconian spending cuts, Cameron’s big Society should be a good backdrop to allow social entrepreneurs to operate and to use our bonus years to create a personal legacy. But though the stage of life has been identified, we as a group still need a name. So, suggestions please (to editor@saga.co.uk).
What does have a name are the three major preoccupations of women in their sixties – face, figure and finances. I am grateful to financial journalist Ruth Sunderland who coined this alliterative mantra and I reckon she is spot on. Think about it. Our looks and our size absorb a lot of our thinking time and spending on clothes and beauty products. But finances – well, we should be thinking about them and they should probably be first on that list but I really would rather stick to musing about Protect and Perfect than my pension.
It rears its head every year, but in an age of climate change, ending the practice of putting the clocks back every autumn now has the compelling argument of massive energy-saving on its side. And Saga research has found that older people suffer particularly from this time change.
They are the most vulnerable to the huge increase in energy bills and their isolation increases as many don’t like driving in darkness. They become reliant on friends and family and expensive taxis and go out much less.
There are, of course, fewer hours of daylight in winter, but surely it is better to have those hours in the afternoon when we can all use them rather than early morning when many fewer people benefit?
To support the campaign for change, see www.lighterlater.org.
So many cultural events turn out to be a disappointment after they have been praised to the skies that I am delighted to report two recent arrivals that are as good if not better than their reviews. The first is Jonathan Franzen’s new novel, Freedom, which is so good that I stopped reading it for a few days to make it last longer. The other is the movie Social Network, which is well up to the standard its rave reviews suggested. Both will very effectively cheer up some of those long winter evenings.