Elderly care on the agenda

Friday 24 October 2014

The challenges of caring for our ageing population is to be the subject of a debate in November aimed at getting islanders, politicians and decision makers thinking about how we will be able to fund a high standard of elderly care in the future.

Family Nursing & Home Care (FNHC), the leading provider of community nursing and care servies in Jersey, has organised the debate. A panel of experts including the assistant director at the King's Fund (an independent UK health policy think tank), Richard Humphries, will answer questions at this free event.

Mr Humphries joined the King's Fund in 2009. He is a recognised national commentator and writer on social care reform, the funding of long-term care and the integration of health and social care, including health and wellbeing boards. He has led the Fund's work in supporting the Barker Commission on the future of health and social care.

Other panelists will be, Policy and strategy director at Social Security, Sue Dehamel, former States of Guernsey Health and Social Services minister, Peter Roffey and Director of system redesign and delivery at the States of Jersey Health and Social Services, Rachel Williams.

The debate takes places at the St Helier town hall on Wednesday 12th November, and will follow three main themes; affordability, delivery and quality of care.

Hamish Marett-Crosby will compere the debate. Mr Marett-Crosby is a freelance journalist and volunteer at Macmillan, who, by his own admission, has a vested interest in the topic and believes it's critical that islanders start talking about this before it becomes too late, 'The population debate and in particular the impact of an ageing population is a hard-hitting subject that will have an impact on all islanders at some stage during our lives and one which may already be impacting our lives or those of our loved ones. We must start looking at ways in which we can manage this situation sooner rather than later.'

FNHC wants to listen to the debate and the opinions of the public and the expert panel, so that it is best placed to make recommendations to decision makers and politicians on the subject.

Islanders are invited to attend, free of charge. Doors open at 6.30pm for a 6.45pm start. Refreshment will be served. To make the debate more interactive and inclusive a designated @FNHC_WhoCares Twitter feed has been set up.