Member's statement: Hourglass: Safer Ageing Week

Member's statement by Mr Robbie Butler on 11 November 2024.

MLA

Mr Robbie Butler

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

11 November 2024

Type

Member's statement

Business

Members' Statements

Heading

Hourglass: Safer Ageing Week

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4667104

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I take the opportunity to make Members aware that this is the start of Safer Ageing Week. Safer Ageing Week is an initiative run by the charity Hourglass, which is the only UK-wide charity dedicated to calling time on harm and abuse of older people. Through its helpline, casework service and awareness-raising, it works daily for safer ageing and a fairer society. I fully support its work and agree that it is time to wake up and speak out on the abuse of older people. Older people experience the same forms of abuse as all other age groups: psychological, sexual, physical and domestic abuse; neglect; and, sadly, economic abuse. During Safer Ageing Week this year, Hourglass asks us to take note and call out specifically the economic abuse of older people. I am told that, every day, the Hourglass helpline hears from older people who have become victims of a range of nefarious individuals. There are distressing accounts of theft and robbery, of being taken advantage of by rogue traders acting in bad faith, and, perhaps most shocking of all, of family members pressurising their older relatives into relinquishing control of their finances or building up massive debts in their name. Since 2021, Hourglass has worked with older victims of economic abuse in Northern Ireland, who have lost an estimated total of around £700,000. Those are only the recorded cases, however; much of the abuse goes unreported. In a cruel twist, economic abuse is often accompanied by emotional blackmail — the aforementioned psychological abuse. Many older people who are grandparents fear losing access to their much-beloved grandchildren if they do not comply with the attempted manipulation or coercion around their money. Often, the family members who abuse the older person are their only meagre means of support if they have been purposely isolated. The abusers in such instances thrive on that type of impossible scenario, as they know that it makes the barriers higher and increasingly impenetrable for the older victim, who is often left powerless. Feelings of shame and fear of further isolation combine to create a wretched environment akin to a psychological prison for many of our older people. What can we do? Indeed, what can I do? First, we can recognise Hourglass and its important work to ensure that older people do not feel isolated, neglected, trapped or powerless. We can speak up about the issue and signpost people to the Hourglass helpline. We can also support Hourglass by looking out for older people in our families, among our friends and neighbours and across our community. We should create an environment in which people are able to grow old safely. Sadly, that is sometimes not the case. Members, take note: we will all get older, and we will all want to be protected from economic and other abuse. Let us support Hourglass and the valuable work that it does, which not only changes lives but saves them, and let us not only do that in Safer Ageing Week.

501 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:32 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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