Age Friendly Society

Posted by Keith Martin on June 02, 2009 at 09:51 AM

I've just launched my new policy for older people, entitled "Age Friendly Society".  While there's lots of what I hope are interesting and worthwhile policies in the document, the one that's received the most interest so far has been my proposal to create an EU-wide bus & rail travel pass, similar to the one already in place in Ireland.  This would allow all EU citizens over 65 free travel on bus and rail across all 27 member states.

There are three key benefits to this proposal: it would help older people living outside their home state (e.g. Irish people living in the UK) to be able to travel easily when visiting their home country; it would make holidaying in other EU countries easier and cheaper for older people (thereby also helping the Irish tourism industry!); and it would help further the reality of a 'single Europe' with free movement of people among a key part of society.

Other proposals in the document include reinstating medical cards for over 70s and reinstating the Christmas "bonus" in social welfare payments.

I hope you find it interesting.

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