OLD AGE
SIR,—As a regular advertiser in the Spectator for the past twenty-eight years, the Institution of which I am secretary is very much involved in the problems covered by Mr. Herb Greer's article 'A Long, Chilly Autumn.' It may be that the woman private teacher belongs to a particularly hardy breed, mentally and physically, but I have yet to find a satisfactory definition of 'Old People.' Within the last month I have been visited by one who, after sixty-eight years of continuous teaching, has now retired at the age of eighty-two. Surely we are dealing with the problems of individual people rather than of a group.
But there is one aspect of the matter on which neither the writer of the article nor others who have written to you have commented--and it is something which puzzles me considerably. Why is it that in the midst of a Welfare State (the ramifications of which would take too long to set out) much more money is now required from voluntary sources for the care of those who are retired than ever before? In our own particular case, in 1939 the cost of benefits and services to our dependants (including homes) was less than f52 per head; in 1962 it was £160 per head. How long are charities such as the GBI going to be able to face this strain—and let me say right away that the number of women pri- vate teachers who need our help is not decreasing? , While the national figure of old people in homes and hospitals, we are told, is about 5 per cent, nearly 40 per cent of all those helped by the GBI are in homes and nursing homes. In order to keep pace with the demand for suitable accommodation, we are having to replace a ninety-two-year-old home with a new and larger building at a cost which will not be less than £100,000.
If Mr. Herb Greer's article has 'got home' to your readers, and I' doubt if many of them require to be reminded of the plight of this section of the community, here is a cause which they might well espouse.
39 Buckingham Gate, SW I *
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