Age Friendly Lambeth – celebrating ageing well
Lambeth’s latest Age-Friendly Forum meeting considered how to take part in “Age Without Limits day”, on 11 June, which will bring a national focus on celebrating ageing and challenging ageism.
The meeting discussed not only what aspects of ageing Lambeth should celebrate on the day, but also what should be challenged.
Celebrating Ageing
The meeting closed on a note of celebration, as participants highlighted the value and contributions of older residents, including the Windrush Generation, and how they helped shape Lambeth’s culture and community spirit.
Older people’s resilience and determination, their culture, keeping communities connected through volunteering, leading families, and being role models also got shout-outs as celebration themes.
Staying healthy in the heat
The Forum meeting also shared ideas on extreme summer heat and its impact on older people as a key group in a project Lambeth is conducting around adaptation to heat risk.
Members also spoke about their perceptions of heat risk, where they’d go for advice and how clear the official guidance was. The feedback identified key methods of communication, the barriers older residents face when trying to stay cool in hot weather and opportunities to support them further. Their contributions will help inform and strengthen the project’s communication and engagement approach with older residents.
Respect and inclusion
As well as giving their views on hot weather messages, attendees shared their thoughts on key principles to guide age-friendly communication, for example, around what language to use, what images are representative and more. This will be used to inform a communications guide Lambeth is developing.
Looking ahead
Jonny Zander of Kaizen, a community research organisation who are working on behalf of Lambeth Council to hear and share older resident’s voices and helping to put Lambeth’s Age Friendly Action Plan into action said: “I’m seeing familiar faces and new faces – it’s great to have so many people coming back and also that we keep widening the circle and including new voices, talking about what will make Lambeth a better place for ageing.”
The next age-friendly forum meeting will take place in the summer and online, following a request from residents to have a mix of online and in person meetings.
Word from the Cabinet
Cllr Tim Windle, joint Cabinet Member for Healthier Communities, said: “This year we published the Age Friendly Strategy, an ambitious and comprehensive document which lays out some of the changes we intend to make in order to improve residents’ experience of ageing.
“But that isn’t the end of the engagement process: we are continuing to hold our Age Friendly Forums to help inform the work we are doing. It’s a really important part of making Lambeth a place we can all call home.”
More information
Residents interested in learning more about extreme weather and the how to prepare for summer heat can head to our Extreme Weather Resilience webpage.
