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At 91, Alf Dubs has two reasons for deciding to remain a Labour member of the House of Lords. The first is personal: whether he can make a contribution, particularly on refugee issues, an area in which he has some expertise, not least because in 1939 he fled Czechoslovakia on the Kindertransport to Britain. The second is whether his family and colleagues think he has the mental capacity to do so. If there is any sign that he is “losing his mind”, they should “please tell me”, he says. The former MP does not want to suffer the same fate as his elderly peers, whom he has seen “wandering around the House of Lords looking completely lost”.
The new Labour government is expected to force peers to retire from the House of Lords at the end of the parliament in which they turn 80. “I’m not sulking,” says Dubs, who personally has “no problem” with such a proposal.
As part of more urgent plans outlined in this week’s King’s Speech, Labour has scrapped hereditary peers. But Dubs wants to go further, favouring an elected second chamber. He believes age is a “very blunt instrument… you have to be careful not to discriminate”. There are peers, such as Neil Kinnock (82) and Michael Heseltine (91) “who make important contributions”. Seniority rather than age might be a more useful indicator.
The debate over whether you’re ever too old to hold a job has become increasingly pressing in the United States in recent weeks after a series of blunders by President Joe Biden. The issue ultimately prompted Biden, 81, to drop his bid for a second term Sunday, under pressure from Democratic lawmakers and donors.
The debate over the president’s age feeds into a broader debate, articulated by Irish writer Fintan O’Toole: “Biden, rightly or wrongly, is a lightning rod for a deep generational discontent.” In other words, anger at older generations who are hoarding jobs and wealth.
Globally, Biden and Trump, who is 78, are in the minority. According to Pew Research, the median age of national leaders was 62 as of May 1. The largest share of world leaders (34%) were in their 60s. About a fifth (22%) were in their 50s, 19% were in their 70s, and 16% were in their 40s. Biden was among the 5% of leaders in their 80s. The most recent British prime minister, Keir Starmer, is 61 and replaces Rishi Sunak, who is 44.
Working longer is a prospect for more and more of us as retirement ages rise alongside life expectancy. But as Andrew Scott points out in his book, The longevity imperative“Given fertility trends, companies will find themselves competing with each other to attract fewer young workers and will increasingly look to older workers.”
To do this, they will have to overcome ageism. While this problem has only been exacerbated by Biden and the House of Lords, it is a persistent problem. In his 1974 book, FunctioningStuds Terkel wrote that while “medicine has increased our life expectancy,” employers have not caught up. “Business science frowns on old people.”
Terkel cited Labor economist John Coleman, who took — and lost — a number of blue-collar jobs as part of his research, which left him “demoralized.” “I had a sense of what professionals my age feel like when they lose their jobs and their confidence starts to plummet,” Coleman said. He was 51.
Emily Andrews, deputy director of work at the Centre for Ageing Better, believes that rather than looking at employees solely “through the prism of age”, it is more important to “know whether people are capable of doing their job”. Scott agrees that it is reasonable for someone elected to a managerial position to demonstrate their cognitive abilities and suitability for the job. “The problem is only requiring it of people over the age of 80, for example. We only think of age in terms of decline – health, cognition – but some things increase, for example experience,” he says.
To make room for new talent and dynamic teams, employers must remain innovative, while avoiding ageism and “denying older people rights and opportunities.” This means ensuring that institutions adapt and adapt to include all ages.
This is not a special plea – young people may not believe it, but growing old happens to them too.
emma.jacobs@ft.com
