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November 2023 - Central Government

A survey has found that 56% of Scots are not satisfied that decision-makers and politicians treat over 50's issues well: A new survey by Age Scotland has found that nearly 6 in 10 Scots over 50 are not satisfied with how decision-makers and politicians treat their issues, with only 8% feeling like their issues are treated with due consideration.

The research was conducted by Age Scotland and Scotinform. They surveyed over 4,000 over 50s from all areas across Scotland and asked them questions regarding how they feel in society and how they feel about life in Scotland as an over 50. A key takeaway from the questions asked was that two-thirds (66%) of Scottish over 50s don’t feel valued by society - this figure is up from 51% in 2021.

Further findings found that 56% of Scottish over 50s feel like life is getting worse for them in Scotland. This figure has risen by 22% since the survey was last conducted in 2021. Only 12% felt life was getting better for older people. When asked about the future, a slim 16% were optimistic about their future, an even lower 8% felt optimistic about the future of generations to come, like their grandchildren.

When asked about how easy it was to voice their opinions in society, 3% claimed they felt it was easy to be heard by decision-makers and 56% said they felt it was not easy to voice their opinions.

Age Scotland’s interim chief executive, Katherine Crawford, said this about the survey results: “A worrying trend we noticed since we conducted our survey in 2021 is a really negative downturn in how older people feel about life in Scotland right now.” The last survey was conducted just after a lockdown in 2021 to put the concerning results into context.

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