Motion no: 14
This BDC is familiar with the call for legislation to outlaw discrimination on the grounds of age in the provision of goods, facilities and services. This is despite promises that it would be brought forward in 2016, 2021 and again in 2022. Several motions to ICTU conferences endorse this policy.
A positive development in the current NI Assembly mandate is the introduction of a Private Member’s Bill from Claire Sugden MLA, who also chairs the APPG for Older People. Her PMB aims to “make provision for the prohibition of unjustified discrimination, harassment and victimisation on the ground of age in connection with the provision of goods, facilities, and services.”
Similar legislation is available in Scotland, England, Wales and the Republic of Ireland, and is making a real difference for older people. There are examples of this in both private and public sectors, such as availability of car insurance for people over an age barrier which is at the discretion of financial service providers (or more often an algorithm) or medical consultants pre-testing people’s ‘mental capacity’ before commencing life-saving treatment.
After a decade of promises, older people across Northern Ireland are being denied the same rights and protections as fellow NI citizens with ‘protected characteristics’, and other older people across these islands due to the development of an ‘older people’s sea border’.
This conference believes that age discrimination legislation in relation to goods, facilities and services must:
- Be framed with a strong purpose clause containing a series of clearly articulated goals.
- Include public, private and voluntary sector in it’s scope.
- Include strong protections for older people across all areas of goods, facilities and services, in particular health and social care and financial services.
- Include people of all ages in the scope of the legislation.
- Learn from the experience of the pandemic not to marginalise our older citizens but to value their continued contribution to our society.
This conference calls on the incoming NIC to work with other older peoples’ organisations and campaign vigorously to bring Ms Sugden’s legislation to belated fruition so that older citizens may get justice. Also, if the PMB is not passed in this mandate, to lobby for its return as an NI Executive Bill in the next NI Assembly.
