Kevin McKenna in a recent Herald piece described how Harold Macmillan’s “You’ve never had it so good” slogan still holds good – for the rich and powerful that is. There is however, another group, of which I am part, check the photo at the top if in any doubt, that is also having it good – the elderly.
A deeply unattractive characteristic of the rich and influential is their inbuilt conceit of natural entitlement. It’s unfortunate many of us in the 65-plus bracket also share the rogue entitlement gene. Those of us fortunate enough to be young in the Swinging Sixties have become the Whingeing Sixties.
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Shortly after the Scottish independence vote in 2014, I wrote a Herald piece apologising to the country’s young people for having let them down. I unwittingly unleashed a geriatric firestorm. The local lunch club was off limits for months. Forty shades of grey muttered behind my back on pension day at the post office.
Many of my contemporaries were indignant that I questioned the elderly’s entitlement to perks not available to succeeding generations. They pointed to a lifetime’s tax and national insurance that meant entitlement to free bus travel, index linked and final salary pensions, free personal care and all the rest. Some mystifyingly based their entitlement on their parents surviving economic depression and a world war.
We are in denial that the world has changed and those of us who have had the good fortune to live into our sixties and seventies can’t expect to be immune from the fall out. I know, I know many of my generation provide financial support to children and grandchildren. The better off may well be assisting younger family members get a toehold on the property ladder. In John Lennon’s words: “We’re all doing what we can.”
The elderly, of course, is not a homogenous group. Although the better off amongst us may be able to support younger family members, there are huge numbers of young people who have no family safety net. These are the young people facing a life of student debt, zero hours contracts, and a constant struggle to scrape together the rent or deposit for homes of their own.
Brexit and the absence of a credible parliamentary opposition at UK level may well result in further erosion of rights in the workplace and loss of social cohesion and social security. The young will be particularly vulnerable.
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Our parents sacrificed much in the post-war years to ensure we would enjoy healthier and more secure lives than theirs. It’s time for our generation to display similar concern for those who follow. The grey vote is undoubtedly influential and it’s time to use that clout to ensure Westminster and Holyrood prioritise the young. Yes, even if it means giving up some of our perks and paying a bit more tax. The sound of the sixties should be, “what can we do to secure the future for our children’s and grandchildren’s generation”?
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