Just as Gordon Brown was lauding Senator Ted Kennedy in the U.S. House chamber yesterday, his government was basking in its victory before the European Union court to uphold a British law forcing people into mandatory retirement at 65. The British, of course, are also in the midst of a big economic downturn, and what their law does is to deny older people the right to work to get the money to provide for themselves with a modicum of decency–especially now that their retirement savings are decimated, just like ours are.
As the BBC reports, “The government continues to consign tens of thousands of willing and able older workers to the scrapheap,’’ said one advocate from Age Concern, the group that brought the suit. And Paul Cann, director of policy for Help the Aged, told the BBC, “Mandatory retirement ages are unfair and the government should act to abolish them as soon as possible…Challenging financial circumstances mean it is even more important for older workers to be able to choose to work longer if they want to. Ageism in all its forms must be eradicated from our society once and for all.”
The irony of this is extraordinary. Kennedy, who is 77 and was going strong until his recent diagnosis with brain cancer–and who has spent his entire life fighting for health care and decent treatment of workers of all ages–receivies a knighthood from the Queen, at the precise moment her government is sending older members of the British working class down the gangplank.
