Age Action’s Policy and Public Affairs team newsletter

Hi all,

Welcome to Age Action’s Policy and Public Affairs team newsletter for February

Mandatory Retirement. 

Age Action has renewed its advocacy efforts around abolishing mandatory retirement, in response to the re-introduction of the Employment (Restriction of Certain Mandatory Retirement Ages) Bill 2024, which is an inadequate response to the growing demand for the abolition of mandatory retirement. The aim of the bill is to restrict mandatory retirement before the age at which one can qualify for the State Pension i.e. 66. It proposes to place the burden on employees to make a written request to stay employed past their contractual retirement age; a procedure many employees may be unaware of, and which can still be denied by their employer. This is the sole ‘restriction’ the Bill would impose on mandatory retirement.

Other countries such as Canada, New Zealand, Australia, the UK, and the United States have abolished mandatory retirement entirely.  These countries have continued to enjoy well-functioning and productive labour markets and workplaces, showing that there is no foundation for the fears expressed by people who want to keep mandatory retirement.

Age Action believes that mandatory retirement is age discrimination. We will be in contact with Ministers, opposition, and civil servants to try to ensure that at a minimum, the Bill takes on board the recommendations made in Pre-Legislative Scrutiny of  this Bill, many of which reflect Age Action’s advocacy so that the drafted Bill provides better protections for private sector employees, and makes better progress towards the goal of ending mandatory retirement entirely.

You can read our press release in response to the Bill here: https://www.ageaction.ie/news/2025/02/25/new-bill-inadequate-response-growing-demand-abolition-mandatory-retirement

In addition, Age Actions policy specialist Nat O’Connor spoke to Corks C103 about the issue. You can hear that on the following link: https://open.spotify.com/episode/7jW5GnvWqS7uzSoMdI2CYh Nat’s input takes place between 42:00 and 51:43.

In addition 

Age Actions Policy and Public Affairs team have engaged with the HSE and HIQA on a number of areas of work, including adult safeguarding, women’s health, and health technology assessments.

Voice Forum Meeting 

Members of Age Action’s Voice Forum met with the Policy and Public Affairs team to hear about the work of the team and their priorities for 2025 as well as highlighting the value of the Forum’s input in the team’s policy work. Recognizing that members participate in different ways, the meeting was recorded and forwarded to members who could not attend.

If you are interested in Age Action’s Voice Forum, please contact david.byrne@ageaction.ie.

Patient Experience  

Age Action is supporting the following two-year project currently underway in the School of Psychology, University of Galway in partnership with the Health Information and Quality Authority. The project aims to improve how the national inpatient experience survey gathers information about experiences of inequality in hospital care, and to increase the number of people from marginalized communities who take part in the survey.

The National Inpatient Experience Survey lets hospital patients in Ireland share their experiences, informing care improvements. However, participation is lower among marginalized communities, and the survey also cannot tell if people from marginalized communities experience better or worse care in hospital.

The project is currently looking for looking for adults who identify as marginalized who have experienced inpatient care in public acute hospitals in Ireland to take part in an interview about this experience.

What is involved in taking part;

• You will be invited to share your experience of receiving inpatient care in hospital.

• You can choose to share your experience in a number of different ways (e.g., in person, over the phone, online).

• You can also choose to share your experience individually or as part of a group discussion.

The Principal Investigator is Dr Chris Noone from the University of Galway, and the lead from the Health Information and Quality Authority is Dr Conor Foley. The project is funded by the HRB Applied Partnership Award, which means that researchers from the university and health services work together on a project that benefits the health service.

For more information about the study and how to take part, contact the research team using the following email: david.healy@universityofgalway.ie