Govt Responds to Report on Economic Potential of Senior Australians

The Government has responded to the final report of the 'Turning Grey into Gold' report on senior Australians. Photo supplied.

The Federal Government is to spend $10 million on a new Jobs Bonus to help keep older Australians in the workforce while initiating a review of the existing laws around volunteering for those who want to retire, to ensure adequate protection from civil liability.

The initiatives are part of a $35 million response to the Final Report of the Advisory Panel on the Economic Potential of Senior Australians (EPSA) called “Turning Grey into Gold”.

The Report found that there needs to be greater choices for older Australians as to how they spend their golden years and better opportunities to stay engaged with the workforce and the broader community.

The Government’s response to the EPSA Report includes $10 million for new Jobs Bonuses to help tackle age discrimination and encourage businesses to employ older Australian who want to stay in the workforce.

The Government says as well it will initiate a review of existing laws to ensure adequate protection for volunteers from civil liability. It says that for many people, retirement gives opportunity to give back to the community by volunteering and any barriers to these opportunities should be avoided.

The Government says it will convene a roundtable with the insurance industry, peak Not for Profit organisations and senior Australians to identify any gaps in the availability and affordability of insurance for senior Australians, including insurance for volunteers and travel insurance.

The report looked at senior Australians who provide an ongoing contribution to future generations by bequeathing money to philanthropic organisations working for the betterment of Australian society, especially in the areas of research and innovation.

The Government says it is considering ways to better promote philanthropy and will include the role of older Australians in the course of this work.

The Advisory Panel on Positive Ageing will provide advice on to Government on ways this can be further progressed.

The Government’s response provides a package including:

• $10m for a new $1000 Jobs Bonus for employers who recruit and retain a mature age job seeker for more than 3 months.
• $15.6m to extend the Corporate Champions program to provide support to employers who wish to promote mature aged employment at their workplace.
• $3.9m to extend the Career Advice service by two years to ensure mature age people have access to free, professional career advice.
• $4.8m to promote education opportunities by adult and community education providers and community organisations to older Australians.

Expanding the More Help for Mature Age Workers initiative, to now be called the “Investing in Experience – Skills Recognition and Training program, to allow industries to benefit from improving the skills of their over 50s workforces.

The Government says an expanded Advisory Panel on Positive Ageing will be established on an ongoing basis.

On the issue of age discrimination and stereotyping of older people, the Government says it will:

• Provide $2.1 million over four years to the Age Discrimination Commissioner to address age discrimination, age stereotyping and ageism more generally, to feed into a media roundtable and communication strategy.
• Review Commonwealth legislation to identify age barriers that prevent continued participation in the workforce for people aged 45 years and over.
• Working to consolidate the five anti-discrimination Acts, including the Age Discrimination Act 2004, into a single law as part of Australia’s Human Rights Framework.

The EPSA Advisory Panel was established in March 2011 and was chaired by Everald Compton AM who will continue as Chair of the expanded Advisory Panel, along with Professor Gill Lewin and Professor Brian Howe AO.

Full details fo the report and the Government’s reponse can be found online (PDF).

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