A Happy New Year from the Retired Members Committee

Union Matters January 4 2023

Wishing all our retired members and all CWU members a very Happy New Year from the National Retired Members Committee.

Without doubt most people in the UK will be glad to see the back of 2022 but unfortunately 2023 doesn’t promise to be any better for the majority of us. The promised resolution to the social care crisis hasn’t materialised, the Triple Lock is still under tremendous pressure from the Thatcherites and their numerous think tanks, the cost of gas and electricity looks like increasing still further in 2033 and the general cost of living crisis looks likely to get even worse. Understandably the Conservative Party are trailing the Labour Party in the polls and this years local elections in March look like confirming the unpopularity of the government. The Conservative Party are on their third Prime Minister within the last 12 months and the farce surrounding the short but catastrophic premiership of Liz Truss and her hapless Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng is still fresh in the memory of most people in the UK. However despite this a Labour victory at the next General Election is not cut and dry and one of the import battle grounds, alongside the RedWall constituencies and Scotland is the vote of the over 50s. Unless Labour can capture the support of this group of votes winning a majority at the next General Election will be very difficult.

The Conservatives promised, just after the last election, to produce a Green Paper on the importance of social and home care for the elderly. They never produced a Green Paper but in September 2021 the government set out plans to reform adult social care in England. It said that £5.4 billion would be used to fund the reforms between 2022/23 and 2024/5.

• £3.6 billion would be used to reform how people pay for social care ( charging reforms). This included £1.4 billion to help local authorities move towards a ,’fair cost of care’ to providers.
• £1.7 billion would be used to support wider system reform.

In September 2022 the  government announced the levy would be cancelled and the reforms would be delayed for two years. In the meantime thousands of elderly and sick pensioners continue to loose their homes and savings to pay for social and home care and is a major contribution to the crisis currently being experienced in the NHS. This is yet another broken promise from the Conservative Government on top of the broken promise to the WASPI women and threats to the Triple Lock.

However despite these facts the vast majority of the over 50s in the UK vote Conservative in General Elections and if Labour want to win in 20024 then they need to change this. Not only are the over 50s more inclined to vote Conservative but they also vote in greater numbers than the younger population. Many of these are people who have previously voted Labour when they are younger. If the The Labour Party are to improve their chances at the next General Election then they must come up with a solution to this problem. Maybe Labour needs a ‘Manifesto for the Elderly’ which deals with the problems and issues that are important to older people. They will need to establish why people change their voting practices as they get older and come up with some policies that change this and they better do this before it’s to late.