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LATEST NEWS
| TAEN Urges Broader Approach to Working Longer | | | Source: TAEN 24.06.10
Responding to the announcement today by the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions that the Government will call for evidence on raising the State Pension Age to 66 and phase out the Default Retirement Age, TAEN – The Age and Employment Network have called on the government to ensure that a comprehensive package of support is put in place for older workers to allow them to continue to develop their skills and careers as they head toward retirement.
Chris Ball, Chief Executive of TAEN, speaking at a joint seminar held with the London School of Economics, said:
“We fully accept the need to extend our working lives – sheer demographics and economics make this unavoidable. But the government needs to ensure that they have policies in place to make working longer a reality".
“To make this work the government and employers will need to look at adapting workplaces and work patterns to offer more flexible working, ending mandatory retirement policies, providing more for employees’ health and wellbeing and, crucially, being prepared to recruit workers in their late 50s and 60s".
“The Government needs to catalyse culture change among British management so that they respond to the challenges of population ageing. The ‘know-how’ managers will require can be taught. However, managing the ageing workforce so that talent is not lost and people are not denied opportunities to develop their careers will require significant changes to occur quickly."
“In general, workplaces are not yet geared up to allow older people the opportunity to continue working. All too often, older workers are seen as being less productive and a drain on resources. Older people typically suffer in the job market and struggle to find work again after being made redundant. Many eventually give up and join the expanding ranks of the ‘economically inactive."
“Clearly more needs to be done to make longer working lives a reality. We urge the Government to take this opportunity to create fairer and more sustainable working practices and not just raise the pension age as a knee-jerk reaction to the deficit problems.”
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