From 2.7 to 3.5 million. This is how the number of people over 65 in Bavaria will develop by 2040. In order to make political decisions with the older generation and not over their heads, the Bavarian cabinet presented the draft of a Bavarian Senior Citizens Participation Act at the end of June. But according to the Bavarian state senior citizens’ representation (LSVB), the law would do exactly the opposite.
“With the draft law, the Bavarian social affairs minister wants to sell the older population an X for a U,” says LSVB board member Franz Wölfl. This means that there are no improvements at the municipal level, but fewer rights for senior citizens. The following point in the paper is particularly critical: “The communities will stoppedto set up a voluntary representation for senior citizens.” The vague formulation takes all the pressure off the municipal umbrella organizations to recognize and implement the need for action, according to the association’s board of directors. For four decades, the LSVB has been committed to quality of life, self-determination and the dignity of older generations annual funding of 120,000 euros.
As controversial as the implementation is, the goals set by the LSVB and the Ministry of Social Affairs are similar: “We need affordable housing, preventive health care and better care options for senior citizens,” Barbara Regitz (CSU) listed as examples. “The political involvement of senior citizens must come from the bottom up.”
Wölfl now finds it all the more incomprehensible that a “well-running system should be put on the sidelines” in order to replace it with structures that have the same content. He is also referring to the second point of the law: an impartial state council for senior citizens is to be created at state level. “Through the State Council for Senior Citizens, we involve the elderly directly – because their experience is valuable, because we want their know-how,” Social Affairs Minister Ulrike Scharf announced weeks in advance. The LSVB already works not only at municipal and district level, but is also represented at state level.
Bureaucratic banter? “No,” says Wolfl. At stake is how a large part of the population can exercise political self-determination. There is already a senior citizen representation in 91 percent of the Bavarian communities. Instead of restructuring them, the powers should rather be expanded. “Municipalities shouldn’t stopped be doing something but meet a minimum standard have to.” That would mean, for example, that municipal senior citizens’ councils have the right to make applications and speak in the city council and that a secretarial position be created.
Whether and in what form the draft law will be implemented will become clear by the beginning of 2023. With the entry into force, the state funding of the LSVB would cease and the association would be faced with the question: dissolve or continue? “Sunday speeches and the mere nodding of the proposals of the Bavarian Minister of Social Affairs are not enough. Bavaria’s older people need a mouthpiece.” So carry on.
“Has the LSVB been too critical of the cabinet in recent years?” the association writes in a statement. “We always have our own loud opinions, even for many who can no longer express them so loudly,” says Wölfl. During the pandemic, the LSVB denounced the handling of old people in homes. They have long drawn attention to increasing loneliness in old age. This also applies to the digital hurdles for seniors: “It’s certainly good for business and industry, but how is a person who grew up with a typewriter supposed to use a computer?” It’s just everyday problems that the LSVB takes care of and which – everyone agrees – must be carried from the bottom up.