Page 920 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 19 April 1994
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The program can act as a source of information and provide an advocacy service when needed. This very valuable program receives about half of its funding from the ACT Government and the rest of its funding from the Commonwealth. Through this program the risk of older people being prematurely admitted to residential care is reduced.
Madam Speaker, what seems to make a fundamental difference to people's ageing is their attitude to the ageing process and the community's attitude to older people. The Government believes that it is vital to promote a positive attitude to ageing, and it is for this reason that it is developing a healthy ageing policy. Many older people in our community have made valuable contributions to this process.
Another common myth is that at the age of 60 or 65 years people become incapable of productive work. In fact, quite the reverse is the case. Research suggests that older people are just as productive as younger people, particularly in jobs that do not require constant physical effort or fast reaction times. Older workers have the advantage of the accumulation of experience and skills. They have fewer workplace accidents, less absenteeism and lower rates of job turnover.
Madam Speaker, the important message to be highlighted by these myths about ageing is that it is no longer appropriate to impose stereotypes of what it means to be a certain age. Nonetheless, while growing older may not be the negative experience that many younger people envisage, older people do have special needs, and there are many issues associated with ageing which need to be addressed by the Government and the community.
Like the rest of Australia, the ACT population is ageing. In the ACT it is expected that the number of people aged 65 or more will increase by more than 60 per cent between 1992 and 2007. Given the youthfulness of our population compared to other parts of Australia, this is no cause for alarm. However, the Government believes that it is important to put in place now mechanisms to cater in a planned way for our increasingly ageing population. With this in mind, I have established an Interdepartmental Committee on Services for Older Citizens charged with the tasks of developing options to address existing gaps and deficiencies in services for older people; identifying the emerging needs of older people in the ACT; and developing a policy framework for providing services to older people in the ACT.
With the assistance of advice from the interdepartmental committee, this year the Government intends to develop a three-year draft forward plan for older citizens in the ACT. The plan will address in a systematic and thorough way the challenges arising from the ageing of the ACT population. The plan will build on the valuable work already carried out by the Legislative Assembly's Standing Committee on Social Policy, the successful ageing ACT project, the ACT Council on the Ageing and others. It will be released for public comment on 1 October 1994, the United Nations International Day of the Elderly. Consultation will ensure that this plan gives close consideration to the present and future needs of older people in the ACT.
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