TCC GROUP 'ONSITE SAFE'

There is no safe reason to discriminate on age grounds

Not dead yet

We all have different strengths and weaknesses, young and old. And properly designed work should be safe and healthy whoever is doing it. So why are older workers told they are no longer up to the job? Hazards editor Rory O’Neill spells out the measures necessary to deliver healthier workplaces for all, regardless of age.

Not dead yet
Executive summary

• Improving health and longevity mean the great majority of workers have no significant health impediments to prevent work up to the age of 65 and for many, where they wish, beyond.

• Workplace health and safety considerations are not a valid reason to prevent older workers continuing in work.

• Age discrimination legislation can and should be used to challenge dismissal or failure to recruit or train older workers on spurious “health and safety” grounds.

• If government targets for increased employment of older workers are to be met, it will require new “work ability” approaches from employers, including occupational health and safety programmes and workplace level “age management strategies”. These programmes should attract government support.

• There is a case for introducing an explicit legal duty on employers under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations, requiring assessment of jobs to see that job tasks take proper account of the physical capabilities of workers, with a particular focus on older workers and any possible adaptations, job redesign, changes in work hours or schedules or reassignment that might be beneficial. The UK already has a similar safety regulation tailored to younger workers. France has a law requiring periodic review of measures by employers to address the impact of physical strains at work on the employability of older workers, with an explicit requirement to remedy problems identified.

• Age management strategies must target “ageing” rather than just “older” workers. Planning occupational health interventions and devising job redesign or alternative work in good time, with policies looking at workers in the 45+ age group, will provide greater scope for creating suitable and healthy work transitions. Career structures should allow a shift to more suitable work, where necessary or desirable.

• Extension to older workers of the “right to ask” for flexible working arrangements would enable older workers to consider alternative work patterns better suited to their capabilities and responsibilities, including the possibility of “sunsetting”, a gradual reduction in work up to retirement.

• Workers should not be denied safety or vocational training because of their age.

• Payment schemes based on productivity should not lead to unhealthy work rates, or work patterns and speeds that disadvantage older workers. Pension schemes should not result in pressure to work longer hours in the years preceding retirement.

• Older workers in the UK are more likely to be economically inactive on grounds of disability than in most other developed nations, suggesting far greater emphasis must be placed on providing support, “reasonable adjustments” and other measures to accommodate people with disabilities in the workplace. Disability discrimination legislation must be effectively applied.

• Older workers are less of a sickness problem to employers than the workforce as a whole. They are more likely to take periods of long-term sick leave, however, so sickness policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

• The Health and Safety Executive must be provided additional resources to develop advice, guidance and enforcement approaches tailored to ensuring the continued productive and healthy employment of older workers.

• Impact of work on the health and employability of older women workers is particularly neglected. Ensuring statutory, research, employer and union strategies are age and gender sensitive is crucial to ensuring the “work ability” of older women workers.

• The impact of health problems related to ageing, for example hearing loss and osteoarthritis, can be minimised if health and safety laws are observed and adequately enforced, minimising any work-related component or exacerbation of the condition.

• The UK’s long hours culture and the intensification of work, with fewer workers expected to do more, is detrimental to both health and productivity. The cumulative harm caused by overwork is likely to disadvantage older workers. Employers should introduce sensible working hours practices, adhering to the Working Time Regulations, and should eliminate excessive work rates. The health and safety enforcement agencies should take action to ensure harmful and excessive working hours and work pace are eliminated.

• Workplace injury and ill-health rates in older workers need explicit attention from statutory agencies including the Health and Safety Executive. Most of the major causes of work-related mortality and morbidity in the UK are more common in older workers. Work hazards lead to tens of thousands of premature deaths every year.

• Occupational health is not just about the health of the worker. It is about the right to healthy and productive retirement. Poor working conditions are stealing healthy retirement years from workers. The three top causes of death in the UK – cancer, chronic respiratory disease and circulatory disease – all have a substantial, preventable, occupational component. Occupational health research and policy must not be limited to ensuring work remains healthy. Both must ensure full consideration is giving to minimising the impact of occupation-related injury and disability in retirement.

• The UK has dropped down Europe's ranking from being the nation whose workers believed they were most likely to be up to their job at age 60, to sixth behind Germany, The Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Finland.

• Employers are not doing enough to accommodate effectively an ageing workforce. More than 1 million workers are struggling to find employment because of their age. Employers are not providing the necessary training and flexibility to retain their existing older workers.

• A new emphasis on occupational health, integrated into board level strategy decisions, is necessary to ensure long-term health problems caused by work are not treated as “tomorrow’s problem”. The problem is today; it is the price paid by the company, the worker and society as a whole that comes later.

• Effective implementation of workplace age management strategies will required training of managers and supervisors and a new mind set, focused on maintaining the positive contribution of older workers.

• Physical fitness in older workers is strongly related to continued fitness to work. Employers can support older workers remaining fit and healthy by providing time, resources and access to facilities for participation in healthy activities inside and outside the workplace.

• Unions should develop policy on occupational health and safety and the ageing worker. At workplace level, older workers’ health and safety should be raised at workplace health and safety committees, and should be discussed with members. Terms and conditions negotiations should consider the impact on older workers.

• Retired workers should not be neglected. Occupational health research must take full account of excess mortality and morbidity in former workers. Unions should investigate measures to maintain contact with retired members so the real extent of work-related health problems are recognised and acted upon, and affected retired members are provided the necessary support and compensation.


Not dead yet

At retirement age, the great majority of us are in full working order. We are living longer, and we are healthier longer. The average person in the UK can expect almost a decade in good health after the age of 65. Work, for most, is something older workers are willing and able up to and sometimes beyond the usual retirement age. Sometimes its only prejudice that stands in the way.

A 2005 report for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) looked at “the common 'myths' about older workers and provides, where possible, evidence and arguments that aim to dispel inaccurate perceptions about older adults and demonstrate that health and safety cannot be used as an ‘excuse’ to justify the exclusion of older workers.”

‘Facts and misconceptions about age, health status and employability’(1) concludes “there is no health and safety justification to exclude older workers from the workforce. Organisations will benefit from efforts to maintain the ability to work of all employees at any age and the adoption and development of flexible retirement practices that retain older workers longer.”

But many firms are not making that effort. ‘Ready, willing and able’, an August 2006 TUC report,(2) revealed that more than a million workers from Britain’s post-war baby boom generation are struggling to find employment because of their age.

Employers are reluctant to recruit older workers or provide the necessary training and flexibility to retain those they already have despite their desire to continue working, the TUC said in its report. According to the TUC, more than a third of the 2.6 million people aged between 50 and 65 who are unemployed or economically inactive would prefer to be working. Some 250,000 said they were looking for a job while another 750,000 said they would like to have one.

The report attacks the idea that the post-war baby boomers are opting to retire early. It says only a third of those who retire early do so entirely voluntarily.

The TUC's deputy general secretary, Frances O'Grady, said: “Most baby boomers are not retiring early to cruise round the world or go bungee jumping. They are being dumped out of work and on to the scrapheap and are scraping by on benefits or small work pensions.”


Work injury forces octagenarian’s retirement

A Sheffield octogenarian has had to give up work after sustaining a serious workplace injury. John Moffatt, 80, received a £5,000 out-of-court settlement from his former employer in November 2006 after suffering the shoulder injury at work.

Mr Moffatt was working part-time as a general handyman for Flex-Seal Couplings in Barnsley at the time of accident, in January 2005. His boot became caught as he manoeuvred a hydraulic pump truck full of empty pallets, causing him to fall heavily. He said: “I was in immediate pain and felt badly shaken and dazed. I tried to pull myself up but was unable to do so because of the pain so had to sit for about 10 minutes before managing to get myself up and see a colleague who took me to the first aid room.”

A series of hospital visits determined Mr Moffatt had suffered muscle damage known as a rotator cuff tear and at some point may need a shoulder replacement. He was also told that he would never regain the full use of his arm. He now needs assistance around the house with things such as DIY and decorating. He commented: “The thing I miss the most is not being able to go ballroom dancing with my wife as this is something we have both done for many years and thoroughly enjoy.”

His legal adviser, Lynne Parker, of personal injury firm Irwin Mitchell, said: “Mr Moffatt really enjoyed the continued independence of working and has been robbed of the chance of being able to work until the age of 80 as he had planned. He was never given any training in respect of use of the pump truck or manual handling.” She added: “Employers need to realise the duty of care they owe to their entire workforce, be they full or part time employees the duty is the same.”





Myths and misconceptions

HSE’s misconceptions report(1) adds detail on the “common ‘myths’ about age, health status and employment” that might be used to justify discrimination:

Myth Chronological age determines health and age brings illness and disease.
Myth Getting older is associated with a loss of cognitive capacity.
Myth Older workers have less physical strength and endurance.
Myth Older workers tend to have poorer sensory abilities such as sight and hearing.
Myth Older workers have more time off sick.
Myth Older workers have difficulty adapting to change.
Myth Older workers find it hard to learn new information making their knowledge and skills outdated.
Myth Older workers have more accidents in the workplace.
Myth Older workers are less productive.



Work capability

The government’s October 2005 ‘Health, work and well-being’ strategy (Hazards 93), includes among its objectives “working with employers to make changes in the workplace necessary to allow people to work to a later age.” It adds that among indicators of strategy success would be “people being able to work longer if they wish.”(3)

A new law barring age discrimination in the workplace law should help. Safety minister Lord Hunt said the Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006, which came into effect on 1 October 2006, would ensure older workers are not denied the opportunity to stay in work. He said: “Research has shown that being out of work is bad for your health, but more importantly being in work is positively good for your health. That is why the new age discrimination laws are so important.”

First findings of the European Foundation’s 2005 survey, published in November 2006, show that workers saying they believed they would be able to do the same job when 60 was at 63.5 per cent in the UK, just above the EU15 average of 61 per cent and the expanded EU25 figure of 58.9 per cent. This represents a significant slip down the rankings. The UK now trails behind Germany (73.6 per cent), The Netherlands (71.2 per cent), Sweden (69.7 per cent), Denmark (68.8 per cent) and Finland (65.2 per cent)(4).

Of the EU15 countries investigated in the previous 2000 European Working Conditions Survey, UK workers were the most likely to believe they’d be able to do the same job at 60 years of age (60.3 per cent compared to an EU15 average of 53.9 per cent). By 2005, the UK had fallen to sixth in the EU15 ranking, in the middle rather than at the head of the pack. The European Working Conditions Survey 2005 involved interviews with almost 30,000 workers in Europe, including over 1,000 in the UK.

And a September 2005 UK study by the Employers' Forum on Age found that almost half the workforce would be happy to work until they are 70, but only one in five thought they would be fit enough to do so.(5)

It is the government’s intention to see more older people in work. Launching ‘Is work good for your health and well-being?’, a September 2006 Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) report on the net positive impact of working on health,(6) DWP said its welfare reforms include reducing “the number of people who need to rely on incapacity benefits by 1 million, and help 1 million older workers and more than 300,000 lone parents into work.”


Not fit to work?

Workers reporting they believed they would be able to do the same job at 60.
Euro ranking

2000 (%)

2005 (%)
1

UK (60.3)

Germany (73.6)
2

Austria (58.6)

The Netherlands (71.2)
3

The Netherlands (58.4)

Sweden (69.7)
4

Denmark (58.3)

Denmark (68.8)
5

Germany (58.0)

Finland (65.2)
6

Finland (57.6)

UK (63.5)
7

Italy (55.2)

Italy (59.9) [=7]
8

Ireland (54.7)

Austria (59.9) [=7]
9

Sweden (54.6)

Greece (58.8)
10

Spain (52.8)

Luxembourg (54.4)
11

Luxembourg (52.6)

Spain (53.5)
12

Belgium (49.4)

Ireland (53.2)
13

Greece (48.4)

Belgium (52.3)
14

Portugal (43.6)

France (48.6)
15

France (40.2)

Portugal (47.5)

Source Statistical comparisons from European Foundation Surveys 2000 and 2005 [pdf]



Better work, all ages

The aim of age awareness at work should be to achieve:

• Working conditions that will avoid disabling diseases in the long-term
• Healthy work that does not put older people at special risk
• Job redesign so that older people can work for longer within their physical and mental capacities
• Opportunities throughout working life to improve skills through training and physical fitness through exercise


Full working order

Just because someone is more likely to go grey, doesn’t mean they are more likely to go sick. HSE’s misconceptions report(1) notes: “Older workers do not take more time off work. Older workers have been found to show lower levels of short term/non-certified sickness absence than young workers, which is the biggest source of absence and disruption for employers… A higher risk of absence from work amongst older workers is not supported by the evidence and therefore is not a valid reason to exclude them from the workforce.”

Finland has led the way on measures to accommodate older workers through “maintaining work ability”, a project driven by the official health and safety agency. Professor Juhani Ilmarinen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health (FIOH) points out that regular physical exercise can keep a worker’s physical capacity “nearly unchanged” between the ages of 45 and 65. He says an older worker taking regular physical exercise is likely to be fitter than younger colleagues who have not exercised.

Ilmarinen says policies should look at ageing workers rather than older workers, starting with those as young as 45. He says: “The main reason for this ‘early’ definition of ageing among workers from the occupational health point of view is that it gives better possibility for preventive measures.”(7)

Older workers, regardless of their ability, are unfairly labelled as unsuited to changes in work, he says. “It has been often incorrectly argued that their competency is no longer sufficient and their experiences are less valid. However, the major reason has often been the uncontrolled changes that have occurred in work and the lack of adjustments urgently needed for fitting their resources to the new work demands. The common need to blame the worker should be redirected towards those responsible for planning and carrying out changes at work, who overlook the need for adjustments.”

However, the issue of disability cannot be dodged if a strategy is to increase “work ability” of older workers. This is particularly true in the UK.

TUC’s ‘Ready willing and able’ report(2) warned “of people aged between 50 and state pension age, 40-45 per cent have suffered from a health problem in the last year and poor health is the commonest reason for having left one’s job.”

It is not that older workers are not up to work. The TUC report says employment levels for men and women in the 50+ age group is higher than among 16-24 year olds. The UK has one of Europe’s highest proportions of older workers in work, trailing only Sweden and Denmark. The average age when UK workers leave the workforce is 63 years. And sickness absence rates in the UK, suggest if anything older workers are less likely to take sick leave.

But the report says: “Employment outcomes are very closely linked to disability for older people. Compared to the average for both the EU and the OECD older people in the UK are more likely to be economically inactive because of disability, and this is especially true for men in their early 60s.

“Older workers who are not disabled have very similar employment rates to non-disabled prime age workers, but there is a significant decline for older disabled people. What is more, the disadvantage faced by disabled people increases for older groups - while the employment of prime age disabled people is 71 per cent of that for their non-disabled coevals, this ratio worsens for older groups, and is just 52 per cent for those aged 60 - 64.”


Job and Finnish

Professor Juhani Ilmarinen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Safety and Health says “the following single actions can improve work ability during ageing:

• training of supervisors for age management
• implementation of age ergonomics
• worksite exercise programmes
• tailored training new technology.”

He says: “The results are better if several actions are integrated. The consequences of improved work ability can be measured as better productivity and quality of work and the better well-being and life quality of ageing workers.”(7)

An Occupational Medicine editorial in September 2006 by Professor Ilmarinen(8) called for a four step solution to “the ageing challenge”.

• Attitudes towards ageing must be changed.
• The knowledge level of managers and supervisors in age-related issues needs to be improved.
• Better age-adjusted and flexible working life is needed.
• Health care services should meet the increasing needs of older workers.

The paper calls for action to address problems with management approaches and work hazards.

“The concept focuses on both human resources and working conditions. The core dimensions of human resources include health, physical and mental capabilities and social functioning, competencies, as well as attitudes and values. The core dimensions of work cover the contents and demands of work, physical, ergonomic and psychosocial work environment, as well as management and leadership issues.”

One Finnish initiative, the VETO programme, focuses on developing the activities of institutions, such as occupational safety and health inspectorates, occupational health service providers and rehabilitation institutes, which help workplaces to manage employee retention issues, well-being and rehabilitation. The programme maintains an individual’s ability to work and employment prospects.(9)



Early work exposures, later problems

Jim Marshall started work in engineering in 1963, aged 16. Within three years he had developed varicose veins from constant standing at work on hard floors. After 20 years in the industry, working as a lathe operative, he gave up engineering for good. But he still has the varicose veins to remind him of the job. The problem was eased in 1991 when he had an operation to remove the veins, but was not resolved completely. “No other members of my family have ever had varicose veins and it is now too late for me to do anything to prevent them,” he told Hazards in 2005. “The problem is that having veins removed when you are relatively young means that others could develop and there are a finite number in your legs. This could lead to serious problems in later life.”

More on the Hazards ‘Standing problems’ webpages


Prejudice is the problem

Even where age does take a toll a person’s physical capabilities, it is prejudice and not problems that have made this an employment issue. The small deterioration expected with age is much smaller than the range of differences that exist across the entire workforce. An older worker whose eyesight and physical strength are not what they were, might still be fitter and more capable and than a day-one working teenager.

Occupational health researcher Simon Pickvance of Sheffield University told Hazards: “Much is made of how the ability to work declines with age. Physical strength, stamina, eyesight, hearing, for example, certainly do decline. But the key thing to remember is that in most cases, the average decline is by a few percentage points over the last 15 years of working life, but the range of performance amongst younger workers is much larger; looking after most young workers will also accommodate most older workers too.

“There are areas – particularly heavy manual work, especially for women over 50 – where older workers are at a special disadvantage and alternative work is essential for almost all, but there are also areas where older workers have particular advantages; more experience, more able to weigh up alternatives effectively, less likely to show signs of exhaustion, and having more commitment to the job.”

The Faculty of Occupational Medicine makes as similar point: “Although natural ageing does result in physiological change, which can affect work capacity especially in motor and visual bodily systems, cognition is not significantly impaired in the age ranges that span working life. Variation in performance within a specific age group far exceeds the change in performance associated with ageing. In addition, older workers often have accumulated experience or learning strategies that may be valuable in contributing to business success. The published literature does not support the popular misconception that work performance declines with age.”(10) It adds: In practice, despite an age related decline in physical strength, stamina, memory and information processing, this rarely impairs work performance.”

Simon Pickvance says the problem is not with the workers, but with the work practices. “Over the last 30 years older workers have been edged out of work, as employers have looked for the super-fit to work flat out for long hours. Long hours and intense work have increased in UK almost uniquely in Europe – so older workers are at a particular disadvantage in the labour market.”

HSE’s misconceptions report notes: “Declines in health or cognitive, physical or sensory functioning can be minimised, prevented or overcome by simple adjustments or personal actions; therefore, age cannot be used as a health and safety ‘excuse’ to exclude older workers from the workforce. Older workers are also quite capable of adapting to change and learning new information, but organisations may need to convince more experienced workers of the value of any changes and/or training.”

It adds “older workers should not be excluded from the workforce on the basis of health and safety, or poor productivity or functioning, rather organisations will benefit from efforts to maintain the ability to work of their workers of all ages. Furthermore, the adoption and development of flexible retirement practices that can retain older workers longer are likely to have benefits for both the organisation and individual older worker.”

Some problems, like occupational deafness, can be compounded by an age-related deterioration in function. The same is the case for osteoarthritis, resulting from general wear and tear on joints – the attrition caused by excessive manual handling could change this from aches and pains to disability.

However, noise induced hearing loss is easily preventable – and given most of us will suffer hearing loss it is something that can and should be minimised. Manual handling can, properly managed, be undertaken with no risk, just by using the correct work methods, staffing levels and lifting aids. Laws place explicit duties on employers to address these problems.

As we get older eliminating the preventable occupational component of these and other problems becomes an even more pressing concern.


WOULD WORK After over 40 years of work, furniture maker Seán Thompson has no plans to retire. Self-employed, the London School of Furniture trained craftsman is now based in a share workshop. He says experience teaches greater caution and a less impetuous approach to work, but age has its disadvantages as all the aches and pains accrued throughout life begin to show themselves. Seán reckons his workshop benefits from young and old working together. The apprentice, Sam Bourn (rear), can get problems solved and advice from Seán and other older workers. Seán, who has a bad back, gets help with carrying and lifting.


Work health is an issue

Work hazards lead to tens of thousands of premature deaths each year, robbing workers of years of life and frequently quality of life in their last years.

Accident rates appear to be higher in older workers, at least according to recent figures. Workplace fatality and major injury rates for workers aged 55+ were significantly higher in both 2003/04 and 2004/05.(11)

HSE’s figures give a work fatal injury rate for men in the 55-59 age bracket of 1.7 per 100,000 workers in 2003/04, and a provisional figure for 2004/05 of 1.5. The equivalent male fatality figures for the 60-64 age band is 1.5 in 2003/04 and 2.3 provisionally in 2004/05. The fatality incidence for all employees was much lower at 1.2 per 100,000 for both years. The same pattern is seen for non-fatal major injuries. Non-fatal major injuries for women employees were similarly elevated.

However, HSE’s misconceptions report concludes overall “older workers do not have more accidents in the workplace.” It adds: “The accidents associated with older workers such as strains, sprains and falls can often be prevented by interventions beneficial for all workers, and older workers may help improve the health and safety culture within organisations as they often take a more responsible attitude to health and safety risks based on their number of years experience in the workplace.”

HSE told Hazards the main explanation for the apparent discrepancy between actual accident figures and the conclusion in the misconceptions report that there is no elevated risk is that officially reported accident figures “do not take account of other important explanatory factors such as occupation and duration of job tenure.”

It adds that a 2005 report for HSE by the Warwick Institute for Employment Research “shows convincingly that after allowing for such factors there is no significant difference in injury rate by age.”

The report, ‘Trends and context to rates of workplace injury’,(12) suggests experience has a clear protective effect, with novices at greatest risk. It says: “In terms of employment tenure, we estimate that: After correcting for exposure, those with current employment tenure of less than a month are almost 400 per cent more likely to have a workplace injury than those with 20 years or more experience in their current job.” The report showed in workers aged 20 and over, relative injury risk in general fell with age, and was lowest in the 45+ age group.

But occupational ill-health is a much more significant cause of harm, and the longer you’ve spent in the workplace the more likely you are to be affected. Occupational cancer alone could account for at least 12,000 premature deaths each year, and possible as many as 24,000 deaths (Hazards 92). The great majority of these are in people in the 60+ age group.

Work-related chronic obstructive airways disease could add another 6,000 deaths. The work contribution to the total circulatory disease toll could be over 20,000 deaths a year. Both conditions are heavily concentrated in the older population.

An HSE information sheet on ‘Occupational ill health age statistics’ pulls together data from four reporting schemes and concludes: “Rates of work-related illnesses are generally higher in older (age 45+) people of working age.” It adds: “We believe these higher rates are explained by the automatic tendency for the prevalence rates for persistent conditions to be greater for older people of working age, and the fact that the prevalence of conditions due to cumulative exposure to hazards will tend to increase with age”.(13)

Sheffield University occupational health researcher Simon Pickvance says: “Most health problems caused by work are more common amongst older workers. Breathing problems, aches and pains (back problems, RSIs), noise-induced deafness, hand-arm vibration syndrome.

“Others, such as occupational cancer, have latencies from exposure to effect, or progress gradually. Some kinds of stress affect people with young families more than older workers – but others like burnout, coping with physical illness and caring responsibilities, fear of job loss or exhaustion affect older workers more.

“So occupational illnesses, as well as general health problems have to be taken into account in making adaptations at work. Preventing them from occurring in the first place is a better option.”

The TUC report, arguing for early preventive action, points to the Whitehall II study of the impact of work on the health of British civil servants which “famously found that job strain earlier in life is linked to developing coronary heart disease and common mental health problems, and that psychosocial factors in the home and the community are also linked to disease development.”

It also backs “regular health screening, workplace and community-based health and well-being programmes, ‘plain English’ sources of advice and information and extra resources for health and safety – if we want the benefit of such advances to be felt by older workers, we need to make sure they are available to everyone.”


Work hard then die

The top causes of death in the UK are the most common work-related health conditions - cancer, chronic respiratory disease, and circulatory disease - and the workplace is a substantial contributor to the overall mortality (deaths) and morbidity (sickness) from these conditions. All three are conditions that become an increasing problem with age.

A November 2005 report in Hazards(14) looked at evidence from a wide-range of sources and estimated the workplace contribution to overall disease incidence (Hazards 92).
Disease
Percentage (%)
work-related
Cancer
8-16
Heart disease
20
Obstructive lung disease
15-20
Asthma
15-20
Musculoskeletal disorders
20


Hazards website





Work cancers increase with age

More than one in three people in the UK will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime. One in four will die from cancer, almost threequarters of these over the age of 60. More than a quarter of a million people in the UK are diagnosed with cancer every year.

The official Health and Safety Executive (HSE) estimate of the occupational contribution toll is based on a single, discredited, paper. Hazards last year(15) revealed a series of fundamental flaws meant this estimate fell between two and four times short of the real incidence (Hazards 92).

One reason HSE is so far off the mark is the Doll/Peto report on which its estimate is based was limited to an analysis of deaths in those under the age of 65. Cancer is primarily a disease of the old – only 26 per cent of the deaths in England in 2003 were in people under the age of 60, so it is likely the great majority of occupational cancers would have been omitted from the figure.

Occupational cancers by definition only occur in those of working age and above and, because of latency periods before the development of disease, many are likely to emerge in old age. We have an ageing population – as other causes of death decline more are likely to survive long enough to develop their occupational cancers.

Hazards put the work-related cancer toll at between 8 and 16 per cent of all cancers. This would translate to between 12,000 and 24,000 work-related cancer deaths year and between 21,600 and 43,200 new cases, the overwhelming majority in people at least 60 years old.

Hazards website


Robbed of retirement

Colin and Sandra Dyal had just celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary when he died in January 2006. Colin had worked for over 30 years for Goodyear in the West Midlands. As an instrument technician, most of his working life was spent in the asbestos riddled boiler house, providing power to the large tyre plant.

Colin was first told he could have the asbestos cancer mesothelioma in May 2002, and the diagnosis was confirmed in August. He was 56 (Hazards 94). Colin died just after his 60th birthday on 11 January 2006.

“He was a great man,” said Sandra. “He never gave up hope. I’m so glad we treasured the days together. There’s a lot of sorrow at the moment, but I will always have the memories.”

Several thousand adults die of asbestos cancers in the UK every year. In 2004 the official death count from mesothelioma, just one asbestos cancer, was 1,969 cases. Because of the long latency period before the disease appears, most will be approaching or over retirement age when the disease is diagnosed. They are robbed of years of life and quality of life.

Hazards website




Older women, older workers

TUC in 2002 warned that the health and safety of older women was being neglected.(16) It called on employers to ask older women workers about the risks they faced, and for occupational health researchers to become more gender aware. It also called for unions to encourage older workers to become safety reps (Hazards 78).

A 2003 report from TUC on women and the menopause(17) said many women have jobs that could be making menopause related symptoms worse, and called for employers to provide better welfare facilities, rest breaks and more forethought and understanding (Hazards 82).

There is also anecdotal evidence that women suffering from asbestos related cancers face a tougher battle obtaining compensation than men. And women’s work more commonly includes “emotional labour” and the related stresses and pressures of caring roles.

But there is very little hard evidence in the literature, because there has been a dearth of detailed studies. ‘Older women, work and health’,(18) a November 2006 report from Help the Aged and The Age and Employment Network (TAEN), commented: “Women now make up nearly half of all employees in the UK. The female employment rate is about 70 per cent and is increasing in older age groups. There are one and a half million female workers aged 45–64 and 113,000 over the age of 65. Yet little is known about the quality of their working lives. At all stages of their working lives women are more likely than men to work part-time; they are concentrated in certain areas of employment; they are more likely to be in low-status jobs; and they earn less than men.”

The report adds: “All these factors influence the well-being of women workers, especially in the later years of their employment. But the combination of age and gender discrimination means that few studies have explored their circumstances or analysed their occupational health needs.”

It concludes: “Any attempt to promote the health of older women within the labour force will come up against two types of discriminatory practice: those against women and those against older workers.” It calls for “greater age and gender sensitivity in the practices of the Health and Safety Executive and associated bodies,” with “the development of an appropriate knowledge base and more appropriate indicators for monitoring the occupational health of older women.”

Authors Lesley Doyal and Sarah Payne of the School of Policy Studies at the University of Bristol conclude that greater commitment to age and gender equality is needed in occupational health research, the organisation of work, workplace health interventions and in the framing of wider social policy if the needs of older working women are to be met.

The Help the Aged/TAEN report says changes will be needed in the culture of the workplace if older women are not to be damaged by psychosocial aspects of their work. “This will involve giving them greater control over their working lives. It will also require more effective policies to facilitate the combination of working lives and care of dependants.” It says workplace health promotion activities can fail to meet the needs of older workers in general and older women in particular, problems that must be addressed.

The report concludes broader public policy initiatives will also be necessary “if the health needs of older women in employment are to be met, including a focus on equalising pensions and other benefits that will enable older women to make health choices about employment.”

Patrick Grattan, chief executive of TAEN, said the report “highlights a neglected issue. There has been little research on the work and health of older people, and of older women in particular. And yet the need for extended working lives in the face of increasing longevity and ageing populations is not in dispute.

“Employment amongst people in their 50s and 60s is rising, driven recently by a growth in the number of older working women. Today, 69 per cent of women aged 50-59 are in paid work and 12 per cent of women aged 60 and over.

“It’s vital that there should be more focus on the needs and health of older working women, an increasingly important group in the labour market, if the government is to realise its ambition of adding a million older people to the workforce.“

CRUSHED HOPES Mary O'Sullivan's husband died building the new Wembley Stadium. Patrick O'Sullivan, 54, was killed on 15 January 2004. Speaking at the unveiling this year of a bronze ‘Building worker’ statue to commemorate those killed in site tragedies, Mary said: “He was crushed to death that morning. And they crushed us to death as well.”


Using the law

Health and safety HSE is clear that health and safety should not be used as grounds to exclude older workers. However, risk assessments should ensure they take account of the individual’s capabilities. They should not make assumptions about supposed capabilities or frailties.

General safety laws apply and should take into account individual factors that might affect health and safety, some of which could be related to age. The Approved Code of Practice to the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations says an employer must “… adapt work to the individual, as regards to the design of workplaces, the choice of work equipment and the choice of working and production methods with a view in particular to alleviating monotonous work and work at a pre-determined work rate.” Regulation 3 says employers should carry out a “suitable and sufficient assessment of… the risks to the health and safety of his employees to which they are exposed while they are at work.”

The management regulations require that risk assessments identify those groups of workers who may be particularly at risk (www.hse.gov.uk/risk). In some instances, this may mean giving particular attention to the needs of older workers. Other regulations covering chemical safety, manual handling, noise at work, computer use and personal protective equipment all include risk assessment requirements that should take account of the capability and needs of the workers undertaking the task, and should endeavour to wherever possible adapt the work to the individual, for example with regard to the design of the workplace, the equipment and the working methods (Hazards 44).

Disability The Disability Discrimination Act requires employers to carry out reasonable adjustments at work to help people with disabilities to remain in work. Official figures suggest 45 per cent of people over the age of 50 have a disability as defined by the law (a long-term health problem limiting normal activities for a year or more). Adjustments could include retraining, job redesign, offering an alternative job, changing working hours or providing equipment.

Age discrimination The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006 apply to anyone who has employees or who enters into a contract with a person for them to do work. It is now unlawful to decide not to employ, to dismiss, to refuse to training, to deny promotion, to give adverse terms and conditions to a worker on grounds of age. Employers cannot:

* discriminate directly – treat a worker less favourably because of age, unless objectively justified

* discriminate indirectly – work practices or rules that disadvantage workers because of age, unless this can be objectively justified

* harass a worker - conduct related to age that violates your dignity or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment

* victimise a worker - mistreatment where they have made or intend to make or support a complaint of discrimination on grounds of age

French pensions law protects workers

Reforms to French pension laws mean employers are now required to consult with unions on the reduction of the physical strains of the job. The legal changes, introduced in August 2003, set a three-year deadline for the consultation.

Under the new system, both sides must meet at least every three years and discuss working conditions and human resource management issues, the skills of older workers and work-related strain.

According to a report from the European Working Conditions Observatory (EWCO), some measures to offset the effects of physically arduous working conditions - such as bonuses, reduced annual working hours, and early retirement options - were already in place prior to the reform law.(19)

However, EWCO says this is the first time there has been an explicit requirement for action to remedy physical strain. Measures to address problems could include early retirement or new work organisation and safety measures to reduce risks.




Making work workable

The TUC is calling on the government and employers to adopt measures to stop an ageing workforce being pushed out of jobs on to benefits and early pensions.

TUC’s ‘Ready, willing and able’ report said the problem of an ageing workforce could not be solved just by raising the state pension age. That would simply push more older people onto benefits. Instead, it calls on employers to adopt “age-management strategies” to retain workers over 50, such as retraining and flexible working.

Specific policies TUC says “might help create greater flexibility” include:

* Requiring employers to survey their employees to establish the age profile of their workforce, and then consider with those workers and their representatives what policies would help workers to remain in employment for as long as they would want ideally.

* Extending to all employees the right to request flexible working arrangements. This would challenge the assumption that flexible working is only for women, and enable workers coming up to retirement to “downshift” gradually.

* A right to retraining for older workers, with paid time off work to learn new skills. Judicious subsidies could encourage employers to welcome this.

* DWP advice on retirement planning, offered periodically, starting several years ahead of state pension age.

* Partial retirement - the ability to move to reduced hours, and supplement lower wages with a part-time pension. Finland and Sweden have introduced part-time sick pay for workers suffering from long-term ill health - workers who have been off ill for a long time can return to pay on a part-time basis, and receive partial sick pay as well.

Flexibility of itself is no panacea, and has to be introduced sensitively. A 2004 paper in the Journal of Occupational Health and Safety – Australia and New Zealand noted flexibility can provide scope for graduated exits and post-retirement options for older workers.(20)

On the other hand, it said flexibility can also entail a loss of job/income security that is vital to retirement planning. It can also entail increased work intensity leading to early burnout and premature retirement as well as a need to modify “fitness for work” models/parameters and to recalibrate workloads and hazard exposure limits for older workers given general health changes associated with ageing, especially in context of less regulated and longer working hours.

A 2005 report from The Work Foundation, ‘The ageing workforce’, noted: “Organisations, who are already open to the well-being debates, might want to think about the health status of their employees and what role they can play as workers move into retirement. Good health is heralded as ‘one of the cornerstones of well-being in later life’.”(21)

It points to a 2005 paper from the universities of Edinburgh and Kent, ‘Older workers and options for flexible work’, which says quality of work must be a consideration because “work can have a negative impact on health through stress, depressed wages, and poor-quality jobs in terms of hours or working conditions.”(22)

The Work Foundation report says: “Part of the solution to this will be for organisations to think about how they can fit jobs to older workers through a changed conception of work itself, as well as promoting occupational health and work-life balance.[23] This might include simple changes such as moving manual workers into more administrative posts.”


Conclusions

The improving health and longevity in the UK population means the great majority of workers have no significant health impediments to prevent work up to the age of 65 and for many, where they wish, beyond. And the UK’s ageing workforce means these workers will be essential to business, the economy and wider society.

Older workers, however, are being denied access to work on spurious health and even health and safety grounds. There is no credible reason for these exclusions.

That is not to say that an age “blind” approach is required. Age does impact on capability and health status does change with age. A lifetime of exposure to workplace risks can take its toll too. However, these effects can be minimised and better managed.

Specific measures at a policy and workplace level can help older workers remain healthy and productive longer. If government targets for increased employment of older workers are to be met, it will require new “work ability” approaches from employers, including occupational health and safety programmes and workplace level “age management strategies”. Greater government resources and support for these initiatives are necessary, at least until approaches are have been properly honed and established.

There is a case for introducing an explicit legal duty on employers under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations, requiring assessment of jobs to see that job tasks take proper account of the physical capabilities of workers, with a particular focus on older workers and any possible adaptations, job redesign, changes in work hours or schedules or reassignment that might be beneficial. The UK already has a similar safety regulation tailored to younger workers.(24) France has a law requiring periodic review of measures by employers to address the impact of physical strains at work on the employability of older workers, with an explicit requirement to remedy problems identified.

Law or not, age management strategies should be introduced at a workplace level and must target “ageing” rather than just “older” workers. Planning occupational health interventions and devising job redesign or alternative work in good time, with policies looking at workers in the 45+ age group, will provide greater scope for creating suitable and healthy work transitions. Career structures should allow a shift to more suitable work, where necessary or desirable.

The UK’s long hours culture and the intensification of work, with fewer workers expected to do more, is detrimental to both health and productivity. The cumulative harm caused by overwork is likely to disadvantage older workers. Employers should introduce sensible working hours practices, adhering to the Working Time Regulations, and should eliminate excessive work rates. The health and safety enforcement agencies, led by the Health and Safety Executive, should take action to ensure harmful and excessive working hours and work pace are recognised as genuine and illegal health and safety concerns and are enforcement and prevention priorities.

Strategies must also consider gender issues. The health of women workers, and particularly older women workers, has been neglected in occupational health research, in preventive strategies and in approaches by statutory health and safety agencies. There are many gender-related workplace factors ranging from type of work, to health issues to work-life balance that should be considered when considering the employability of older workers.

A new emphasis on occupational health, integrated into board level strategy decisions, is necessary to ensure long-term health problems caused by work are not treated as “tomorrow’s problem”. The problem is today; it is the price paid by the company, the worker and wider society that comes later. Effective implementation of workplace age management strategies will required training of managers and supervisors and a new mind set, focused on maintaining the positive contribution of older workers.

Failure on the part of employers to make any efforts to accommodate older workers could constitute age or disability discrimination. Workers, unions and other advocates should make sure they use age and disability discrimination laws effectively to ensure employers at least meet their minimum legal duties.

Extension to older workers of the “right to ask” for flexible working arrangements would enable older workers to consider alternative work patterns better suited to their capabilities and responsibilities, including the possibility of “sunsetting”, a gradual reduction in work up to retirement. Workers should not be denied safety or vocational training because of their age.

Older workers are less of a sickness problem to employers than the workforce as a whole. They are more likely to take periods of long-term sick leave, however, so sickness policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

Physical fitness in older workers is strongly related to continued fitness to work. Employers can support older workers remaining fit and healthy by providing time, resources and access to facilities for participation in healthy activities inside and outside the workplace.

Official health and safety agencies must be fully involved in overseeing implementation of ageing workforce policies and practices. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) must be provided additional resources to develop advice, guidance and enforcement approaches tailored to ensuring the continued productive and healthy employment of older workers.

Occupational health is not just about the health of the worker. It is about the right to healthy and productive retirement. Poor working conditions are stealing healthy retirement years from workers. Occupational health research and policy must not be limited to ensuring work remains healthy. Both must ensure full consideration is giving to minimising the impact of occupation-related injury and disability in retirement.

Finally, health and safety and the older worker must be a core issue for trade unions. Unions should develop policy on occupational health and safety and the ageing worker. At workplace level, older workers’ health and safety should be raised at workplace health and safety committees, and should be discussed with members. All terms and conditions negotiations should consider the impact on older workers. Unions should also investigate measures to maintain contact with retired members so the real extent of work-related health problems are recognised and acted upon, and affected retired members are provided the necessary support and compensation.


Safety reps’ checklist

Has your workplace got an age policy? It should have. And it should make sure age is not an issue neglected by either the union or the employer.

Union safety Make sure age policy and issues is not overlooked at safety committee meetings. Ensure safety reps are consulted about all issues relating to the recruitment, training and employment of older workers.

Training Workers should not be denied vocational or safety training because of their age. Training should allow older workers to prepare for work that is appropriate to their skills and capabilities.

Suitable work Career structures should allow older workers to move away from work that is a particular risk for them as they get older to work that uses their skills, experience and capabilities.

Flexible work Flexible working practices may allow older workers to reduce their working hours, or to arrange their working hours around caring commitments or preparation for retirement. Examples would include “sunsetting”, a phased hours reduction in the years leading to retirement.

Sickness absence Policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

Health and safety Risk assessments will always take into account particular susceptibility to injury or illness of individuals. Older workers who may have particular needs and susceptibilities must be consulted directly.

Payment schemes Where pay is based on meeting production targets, these should not lead to disadvantage because of age-related factors.

Work rates Are work rates and hours excessive and bad for health? Unions should ensure agreed work patterns are not harmful and do not lead to difficulties or disadvantage for older workers.

Health promotion Opportunities should be provided to help employees to maintain their ability to work, through exercise or addressing physical health problems.

Pension schemes Company pension schemes should not result in pressure to work longer hours in the years preceding retirement.

Gender issues Have health and safety issues affecting older women been given specific attention? A gender neutral approach can neglect differences in the types of jobs and pressures faced sometime by women and men at work.

Consultation All age-sensitive policies and issues should be negotiated with the involvement of older workers and union reps.

Worker involvement Unions should ensure older workers are properly involved and consulted on union and workplace matters.

Retired members Safety reps should endeavour to ensure information on work-related ill-health suffered by retired members is collated, so the true extent of the problems caused by work is ascertained. Retired members should be provided advice and assistance about possible compensation claims for work-related ill-health.




References

1. Facts and misconceptions about age, health status and employability. Report Number HSL/2005/20. [pdf]

2. Ready, willing and able, TUC, August 2006.

3. Health, work and well-being – Caring for our future. ISBN: 1-84388-608-4. HM Government, October 2005. DWP news release and full report [pdf]. DWP news release 19 October 2005.

4. First findings of the European Working Conditions Survey: Working conditions in Europe – what workers say. European Foundation news release, 7 November 2006. Fourth European Working Conditions Survey (2005). European Foundation survey 2000, question on “sustainability of work.”

5. Attitude not age, Employers’ Forum on Age, September 2005. EFA publications webpage.

6. Is work good for your health and well-being?, DWP, September 2006. DWP news release. Health, work and well-being webpages and executive summary of the report and [pdf]. Full report [pdf]

7. Juhani Ilmarinen. Ageing workers, Occupational and Environmental Medicine, volume 58, page 546, 2001.

8. Juhani Ilmarinen. The ageing workforce - challenges for occupational health, Occupational Medicine, volume 56, pages 362-364, 2006.

9. Employment initiatives for an ageing workforce in the EU15, European Foundation, 2006 [pdf]

10. Position paper on age and employment, Faculty of Occupational Medicine of the Royal College of Physicians, August 2004. [pdf]

11. HSE age and gender accident statistics, 2003/04 and 2004/05 (provisional)
Table 11a: Injuries to men employees by age of injured person and severity of injury, 2003/04 - 2004/05p.
Table 11b: Injuries to women employees by age of injured person and severity of injury, 2003/04 - 2004/05p.

12. Trends and context to rates of workplace injury, HSE Research Report RR386, 2005 and [pdf]

13. Occupational ill health age statistics: Information sheet, HSE.

14. A job to die for?, Hazards, number 92, October-December 2005.

15. Burying the evidence, Hazards 92, October-December 2005.

16. Health and work in older women: a neglected issue, TUC/Pennell Institute, 2002. TUC news release

17. Working through the change: health and safety and the menopause, TUC, 2003 [pdf]

18. Older women, work and health, Help the Aged and The Age and Employment Network (TAEN), November 2006. News release. [pdf]

19. Managing physical strain at work, EWCO news pages, 13 August 2004.
Gilles M, Guérin F and Rousseau T, Réduire la pénibilité au travail (Reduce physical strain at work) in Travail et changement (Work and change), ANACT, No. 294, Feb/Mar 2004. [in French].

20. Callaghan K, Francis M and Gorman D. Editorial: Age and employment, Journal of Occupational Health and Safety – Australia and New Zealand, vol.20, pages 291-295, 2004.

21. Natalie Turner and Laura Williams. The ageing workforce, The Work Foundation, 2005. [pdf]

22. Loretto W, Vickerstaff S and White P, Older workers and Options for Flexible Work, Working Paper Series No 31, Universities of Edinburgh and Kent, 2005

23. Hirsch B, Macpherson D and Hardy M, Occupational age structure and access for older workers, Industrial and Labour Relations Review, Vol 53 No 3, pp401–418, 2000.

24. Too young to die, Hazards, Number 95, July-September 2006.

Other sources

European Foundation ageing workforce case studies

Age and working conditions in the European Union, European Foundation, 2003.

Foundation Focus - Issue 2: Age and employment, European Foundation, September 2006.

Employment in Europe, European Commission, October 2003.
Summary document [pdf] or and full report [pdf].

ACAS Age in the workplace advice leaflet. ACAS helpline on 08457 47 47 47.

Occupational health and safety issues and for the older worker, New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services, USA, December 2003 [pdf]

Why should a workplace look at issues concerning ageing workers?, CCOHS factsheet, Canada, 2002.

Older workers: living longer, working longer, DELSA newsletter issue 2, OECD, 2006. [pdf]


Relevant websites

Hazards age webpages

Hazards work and health webpages

TUC workSMART ten point age regulation myth-buster

HSE age and gender statistics

FIOH ‘Ageing and work’ webpages

European Foundation ‘age’ webpages

European Foundation ‘Ageing and work’ webpages.

TAEN – The Age and Employment Network, 207-221 Pentonville Road, London N1 9UZ. Tel: 020 7843 1590.

Agebusters website

DWP’s Age Positive project

Employers Forum on Age (EFA)



HAZARDS MAGAZINE • WORKERS' HEALTH INTERNATIONAL NEWS



















There is no safe reason to discriminate on age grounds

Not dead yet

We all have different strengths and weaknesses, young and old. And properly
designed work should be safe and healthy whoever is doing it. So why are
older workers told they are no longer up to the job? Hazards
editor Rory O’Neill spells out the measures necessary to deliver
healthier workplaces for all, regardless of age.

Not dead yet

Executive summary

• Improving health and longevity mean
the great majority of workers have no significant health impediments
to prevent work up to the age of 65 and for many, where they wish,
beyond.

• Workplace health and safety considerations
are not a valid reason to prevent older workers continuing in work.

• Age discrimination legislation can
and should be used to challenge dismissal or failure to recruit
or train older workers on spurious “health and safety”
grounds.

• If government targets for increased
employment of older workers are to be met, it will require new “work
ability” approaches from employers, including occupational
health and safety programmes and workplace level “age management
strategies”. These programmes should attract government support.

• There is a case for introducing an
explicit legal duty on employers under the Management of Health
and Safety at Work Regulations, requiring assessment of jobs to
see that job tasks take proper account of the physical capabilities
of workers, with a particular focus on older workers and any possible
adaptations, job redesign, changes in work hours or schedules or
reassignment that might be beneficial. The UK already has a similar
safety regulation tailored to younger workers. France has a law
requiring periodic review of measures by employers to address the
impact of physical strains at work on the employability of older
workers, with an explicit requirement to remedy problems identified.

• Age management strategies must target
“ageing” rather than just “older” workers.
Planning occupational health interventions and devising job redesign
or alternative work in good time, with policies looking at workers
in the 45+ age group, will provide greater scope for creating suitable
and healthy work transitions. Career structures should allow a shift
to more suitable work, where necessary or desirable.

• Extension to older workers of the “right
to ask” for flexible working arrangements would enable older
workers to consider alternative work patterns better suited to their
capabilities and responsibilities, including the possibility of
“sunsetting”, a gradual reduction in work up to retirement.

• Workers should not be denied safety
or vocational training because of their age.

• Payment schemes based on productivity
should not lead to unhealthy work rates, or work patterns and speeds
that disadvantage older workers. Pension schemes should not result
in pressure to work longer hours in the years preceding retirement.

• Older workers in the UK are more likely
to be economically inactive on grounds of disability than in most
other developed nations, suggesting far greater emphasis must be
placed on providing support, “reasonable adjustments”
and other measures to accommodate people with disabilities in the
workplace. Disability discrimination legislation must be effectively
applied.

• Older workers are less of a sickness
problem to employers than the workforce as a whole. They are more
likely to take periods of long-term sick leave, however, so sickness
policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

• The Health and Safety Executive must
be provided additional resources to develop advice, guidance and
enforcement approaches tailored to ensuring the continued productive
and healthy employment of older workers.

• Impact of work on the health and employability
of older women workers is particularly neglected. Ensuring statutory,
research, employer and union strategies are age and gender sensitive
is crucial to ensuring the “work ability” of older women
workers.

• The impact of health problems related
to ageing, for example hearing loss and osteoarthritis, can be minimised
if health and safety laws are observed and adequately enforced,
minimising any work-related component or exacerbation of the condition.

• The UK’s long hours culture and
the intensification of work, with fewer workers expected to do more,
is detrimental to both health and productivity. The cumulative harm
caused by overwork is likely to disadvantage older workers. Employers
should introduce sensible working hours practices, adhering to the
Working Time Regulations, and should eliminate excessive work rates.
The health and safety enforcement agencies should take action to
ensure harmful and excessive working hours and work pace are eliminated.

• Workplace injury and ill-health rates
in older workers need explicit attention from statutory agencies
including the Health and Safety Executive. Most of the major causes
of work-related mortality and morbidity in the UK are more common
in older workers. Work hazards lead to tens of thousands of premature
deaths every year.

• Occupational health is not just about
the health of the worker. It is about the right to healthy and productive
retirement. Poor working conditions are stealing healthy retirement
years from workers. The three top causes of death in the UK –
cancer, chronic respiratory disease and circulatory disease –
all have a substantial, preventable, occupational component. Occupational
health research and policy must not be limited to ensuring work
remains healthy. Both must ensure full consideration is giving to
minimising the impact of occupation-related injury and disability
in retirement.

• The UK has dropped down Europe's ranking
from being the nation whose workers believed they were most likely
to be up to their job at age 60, to sixth behind Germany, The Netherlands,
Sweden, Denmark and Finland.

• Employers are not doing enough to accommodate
effectively an ageing workforce. More than 1 million workers are
struggling to find employment because of their age. Employers are
not providing the necessary training and flexibility to retain their
existing older workers.

• A new emphasis on occupational health,
integrated into board level strategy decisions, is necessary to
ensure long-term health problems caused by work are not treated
as “tomorrow’s problem”. The problem is today;
it is the price paid by the company, the worker and society as a
whole that comes later.

• Effective implementation of workplace
age management strategies will required training of managers and
supervisors and a new mind set, focused on maintaining the positive
contribution of older workers.

• Physical fitness in older workers is
strongly related to continued fitness to work. Employers can support
older workers remaining fit and healthy by providing time, resources
and access to facilities for participation in healthy activities
inside and outside the workplace.

• Unions should develop policy on occupational
health and safety and the ageing worker. At workplace level, older
workers’ health and safety should be raised at workplace health
and safety committees, and should be discussed with members. Terms
and conditions negotiations should consider the impact on older
workers.

• Retired workers should not be neglected.
Occupational health research must take full account of excess mortality
and morbidity in former workers. Unions should investigate measures
to maintain contact with retired members so the real extent of work-related
health problems are recognised and acted upon, and affected retired
members are provided the necessary support and compensation.

Not dead yet

At retirement age, the great majority of us are in full working order.
We are living longer, and we are healthier longer. The average person
in the UK can expect almost a decade in good health after the age of 65.
Work, for most, is something older workers are willing and able up to
and sometimes beyond the usual retirement age. Sometimes its only prejudice
that stands in the way.

A 2005 report for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) looked at “the
common 'myths' about older workers and provides, where possible, evidence
and arguments that aim to dispel inaccurate perceptions about older adults
and demonstrate that health and safety cannot be used as an ‘excuse’
to justify the exclusion of older workers.”

‘Facts and misconceptions about age, health status and employability’(1)
concludes “there is no health and safety justification to exclude
older workers from the workforce. Organisations will benefit from efforts
to maintain the ability to work of all employees at any age and the adoption
and development of flexible retirement practices that retain older workers
longer.”

But many firms are not making that effort. ‘Ready, willing and
able’, an August 2006 TUC report,(2)
revealed that more than a million workers from Britain’s post-war
baby boom generation are struggling to find employment because of their
age.

Employers are reluctant to recruit older workers or provide the necessary
training and flexibility to retain those they already have despite their
desire to continue working, the TUC said in its report. According to the
TUC, more than a third of the 2.6 million people aged between 50 and 65
who are unemployed or economically inactive would prefer to be working.
Some 250,000 said they were looking for a job while another 750,000 said
they would like to have one.

The report attacks the idea that the post-war baby boomers are opting
to retire early. It says only a third of those who retire early do so
entirely voluntarily.

The TUC's deputy general secretary, Frances O'Grady, said: “Most
baby boomers are not retiring early to cruise round the world or go bungee
jumping. They are being dumped out of work and on to the scrapheap and
are scraping by on benefits or small work pensions.”

Work injury forces octagenarian’s retirement

A Sheffield octogenarian has had to give up work after sustaining
a serious workplace injury. John Moffatt, 80, received a £5,000
out-of-court settlement from his former employer in November 2006
after suffering the shoulder injury at work.

Mr Moffatt was working part-time as a general handyman for Flex-Seal
Couplings in Barnsley at the time of accident, in January 2005.
His boot became caught as he manoeuvred a hydraulic pump truck full
of empty pallets, causing him to fall heavily. He said: “I
was in immediate pain and felt badly shaken and dazed. I tried to
pull myself up but was unable to do so because of the pain so had
to sit for about 10 minutes before managing to get myself up and
see a colleague who took me to the first aid room.”

A series of hospital visits determined Mr Moffatt had suffered
muscle damage known as a rotator cuff tear and at some point may
need a shoulder replacement. He was also told that he would never
regain the full use of his arm. He now needs assistance around the
house with things such as DIY and decorating. He commented: “The
thing I miss the most is not being able to go ballroom dancing with
my wife as this is something we have both done for many years and
thoroughly enjoy.”

His legal adviser, Lynne Parker, of personal injury firm Irwin
Mitchell, said: “Mr Moffatt really enjoyed the continued independence
of working and has been robbed of the chance of being able to work
until the age of 80 as he had planned. He was never given any training
in respect of use of the pump truck or manual handling.” She
added: “Employers need to realise the duty of care they owe
to their entire workforce, be they full or part time employees the
duty is the same.”

Myths and misconceptions

HSE’s misconceptions report(1)
adds detail on the “common ‘myths’ about age, health
status and employment” that might be used to justify discrimination:

Myth Chronological age determines
health and age brings illness and disease.

Myth Getting older is associated
with a loss of cognitive capacity.

Myth Older workers have less physical
strength and endurance.

Myth Older workers tend to have
poorer sensory abilities such as sight and hearing.

Myth Older workers have more time
off sick.

Myth Older workers have difficulty
adapting to change.

Myth Older workers find it hard
to learn new information making their knowledge and skills outdated.

Myth Older workers have more accidents
in the workplace.

Myth Older workers are less productive.

Work capability

The government’s October 2005 ‘Health, work and well-being’
strategy (Hazards 93), includes among its objectives “working
with employers to make changes in the workplace necessary to allow people
to work to a later age.” It adds that among indicators of strategy
success would be “people being able to work longer if they wish.”(3)

A new law barring age discrimination in the workplace law should help.
Safety minister Lord Hunt said the Employment Equality (Age) Regulations
2006, which came into effect on 1 October 2006, would ensure older workers
are not denied the opportunity to stay in work. He said: “Research
has shown that being out of work is bad for your health, but more importantly
being in work is positively good for your health. That is why the new
age discrimination laws are so important.”

First findings of the European Foundation’s 2005 survey, published
in November 2006, show that workers saying they believed they would be
able to do the same job when 60 was at 63.5 per cent in the UK, just above
the EU15 average of 61 per cent and the expanded EU25 figure of 58.9 per
cent. This represents a significant slip down the rankings. The UK now
trails behind Germany (73.6 per cent), The Netherlands (71.2 per cent),
Sweden (69.7 per cent), Denmark (68.8 per cent) and Finland (65.2 per
cent)(4).

Of the EU15 countries investigated in the previous 2000 European Working
Conditions Survey, UK workers were the most likely to believe they’d
be able to do the same job at 60 years of age (60.3 per cent compared
to an EU15 average of 53.9 per cent). By 2005, the UK had fallen to sixth
in the EU15 ranking, in the middle rather than at the head of the pack.
The European Working Conditions Survey 2005 involved interviews with almost
30,000 workers in Europe, including over 1,000 in the UK.

And a September 2005 UK study by the Employers' Forum on Age found that
almost half the workforce would be happy to work until they are 70, but
only one in five thought they would be fit enough to do so.(5)

It is the government’s intention to see more older people in work.
Launching ‘Is work good for your health and well-being?’,
a September 2006 Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) report on the
net positive impact of working on health,(6)
DWP said its welfare reforms include reducing “the number of people
who need to rely on incapacity benefits by 1 million, and help 1 million
older workers and more than 300,000 lone parents into work.”

Not fit to work?

Workers reporting they believed they would
be able to do the same job at 60.

Euro ranking
2000 (%)
2005 (%)


1
UK (60.3)

Germany (73.6)


2
Austria (58.6)
The Netherlands (71.2)


3
The Netherlands (58.4)

Sweden (69.7)


4
Denmark (58.3)
Denmark (68.8)


5
Germany (58.0)
Finland (65.2)


6
Finland (57.6)
UK (63.5)


7
Italy (55.2)
Italy (59.9) [=7]


8
Ireland (54.7)
Austria (59.9) [=7]


9
Sweden (54.6)
Greece (58.8)


10
Spain (52.8)
Luxembourg (54.4)


11
Luxembourg (52.6)
Spain (53.5)


12
Belgium (49.4)
Ireland (53.2)


13
Greece (48.4)
Belgium (52.3)


14
Portugal (43.6)
France (48.6)


15
France (40.2)
Portugal (47.5)

Source Statistical
comparisons from European Foundation Surveys 2000
and 2005
[pdf]

Better work,
all ages

The aim of age awareness at work should be to achieve:

• Working conditions that will avoid disabling diseases
in the long-term

• Healthy work that does not put older people at special
risk

• Job redesign so that older people can work for longer
within their physical and mental capacities

• Opportunities throughout working life to improve skills
through training and physical fitness through exercise

Full working order

Just because someone is more likely to go grey, doesn’t mean they
are more likely to go sick. HSE’s misconceptions report(1)
notes: “Older workers do not take more time off work. Older
workers have been found to show lower levels of short term/non-certified
sickness absence than young workers, which is the biggest source of absence
and disruption for employers… A higher risk of absence from work
amongst older workers is not supported by the evidence and therefore is
not a valid reason to exclude them from the workforce.”

Finland has led the way on measures to accommodate older workers through
“maintaining work ability”, a project driven by the official
health and safety agency. Professor Juhani Ilmarinen of the Finnish Institute
of Occupational Health (FIOH) points out that regular physical exercise
can keep a worker’s physical capacity “nearly unchanged”
between the ages of 45 and 65. He says an older worker taking regular
physical exercise is likely to be fitter than younger colleagues who have
not exercised.

Ilmarinen says policies should look at ageing workers rather than older
workers, starting with those as young as 45. He says: “The main
reason for this ‘early’ definition of ageing among workers
from the occupational health point of view is that it gives better possibility
for preventive measures.”(7)

Older workers, regardless of their ability, are unfairly labelled as
unsuited to changes in work, he says. “It has been often incorrectly
argued that their competency is no longer sufficient and their experiences
are less valid. However, the major reason has often been the uncontrolled
changes that have occurred in work and the lack of adjustments urgently
needed for fitting their resources to the new work demands. The common
need to blame the worker should be redirected towards those responsible
for planning and carrying out changes at work, who overlook the need for
adjustments.”

However, the issue of disability cannot be dodged if a strategy is to
increase “work ability” of older workers. This is particularly
true in the UK.

TUC’s ‘Ready willing and able’ report(2)
warned “of people aged between 50 and state pension age, 40-45 per
cent have suffered from a health problem in the last year and poor health
is the commonest reason for having left one’s job.”

It is not that older workers are not up to work. The TUC report says
employment levels for men and women in the 50+ age group is higher than
among 16-24 year olds. The UK has one of Europe’s highest proportions
of older workers in work, trailing only Sweden and Denmark. The average
age when UK workers leave the workforce is 63 years. And sickness absence
rates in the UK, suggest if anything older workers are less likely to
take sick leave.

But the report says: “Employment outcomes are very closely linked
to disability for older people. Compared to the average for both the EU
and the OECD older people in the UK are more likely to be economically
inactive because of disability, and this is especially true for men in
their early 60s.

“Older workers who are not disabled have very similar employment
rates to non-disabled prime age workers, but there is a significant decline
for older disabled people. What is more, the disadvantage faced by disabled
people increases for older groups - while the employment of prime age
disabled people is 71 per cent of that for their non-disabled coevals,
this ratio worsens for older groups, and is just 52 per cent for those
aged 60 - 64.”

Job
and Finnish

Professor Juhani Ilmarinen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational
Safety and Health says “the following single actions can improve
work ability during ageing:

• training of supervisors for age management

• implementation of age ergonomics

• worksite exercise programmes

• tailored training new technology.”

He says: “The results are better if several actions are integrated.
The consequences of improved work ability can be measured as better
productivity and quality of work and the better well-being and life
quality of ageing workers.”(7)

An Occupational Medicine editorial in September 2006 by Professor
Ilmarinen(8)
called for a four step solution to “the ageing challenge”.

• Attitudes towards ageing must be changed.

• The knowledge level of managers and supervisors in age-related
issues needs to be improved.

• Better age-adjusted and flexible working life is needed.

• Health care services should meet the increasing needs of
older workers.

The paper calls for action to address problems with management
approaches and work hazards.

“The concept focuses on both human resources and working
conditions. The core dimensions of human resources include health,
physical and mental capabilities and social functioning, competencies,
as well as attitudes and values. The core dimensions of work cover
the contents and demands of work, physical, ergonomic and psychosocial
work environment, as well as management and leadership issues.”

One Finnish initiative, the VETO programme, focuses on developing
the activities of institutions, such as occupational safety and
health inspectorates, occupational health service providers and
rehabilitation institutes, which help workplaces to manage employee
retention issues, well-being and rehabilitation. The programme maintains
an individual’s ability to work and employment prospects.(9)

Early work exposures, later
problems

Jim
Marshall started work in engineering in 1963, aged 16. Within three
years he had developed varicose veins from constant standing at
work on hard floors. After 20 years in the industry, working as
a lathe operative, he gave up engineering for good. But he still
has the varicose veins to remind him of the job. The problem was
eased in 1991 when he had an operation to remove the veins, but
was not resolved completely. “No other members of my family
have ever had varicose veins and it is now too late for me to do
anything to prevent them,” he told Hazards in 2005.
“The problem is that having veins removed when you are relatively
young means that others could develop and there are a finite number
in your legs. This could lead to serious problems in later life.”

More
on the Hazards ‘Standing problems’ webpages

Prejudice is the problem

Even where age does take a toll a person’s physical capabilities,
it is prejudice and not problems that have made this an employment issue.
The small deterioration expected with age is much smaller than the range
of differences that exist across the entire workforce. An older worker
whose eyesight and physical strength are not what they were, might still
be fitter and more capable and than a day-one working teenager.

Occupational health researcher Simon Pickvance of Sheffield University
told Hazards: “Much is made of how the ability to work
declines with age. Physical strength, stamina, eyesight, hearing, for
example, certainly do decline. But the key thing to remember is that in
most cases, the average decline is by a few percentage points over the
last 15 years of working life, but the range of performance amongst younger
workers is much larger; looking after most young workers will also accommodate
most older workers too.

“There are areas – particularly heavy manual work, especially
for women over 50 – where older workers are at a special disadvantage
and alternative work is essential for almost all, but there are also areas
where older workers have particular advantages; more experience, more
able to weigh up alternatives effectively, less likely to show signs of
exhaustion, and having more commitment to the job.”

The Faculty of Occupational Medicine makes as similar point: “Although
natural ageing does result in physiological change, which can affect work
capacity especially in motor and visual bodily systems, cognition is not
significantly impaired in the age ranges that span working life. Variation
in performance within a specific age group far exceeds the change in performance
associated with ageing. In addition, older workers often have accumulated
experience or learning strategies that may be valuable in contributing
to business success. The published literature does not support the popular
misconception that work performance declines with age.”(10)
It adds: In practice, despite an age related decline in physical strength,
stamina, memory and information processing, this rarely impairs work performance.”

Simon Pickvance says the problem is not with the workers, but with the
work practices. “Over the last 30 years older workers have been
edged out of work, as employers have looked for the super-fit to work
flat out for long hours. Long hours and intense work have increased in
UK almost uniquely in Europe – so older workers are at a particular
disadvantage in the labour market.”

HSE’s misconceptions report notes: “Declines in health or
cognitive, physical or sensory functioning can be minimised, prevented
or overcome by simple adjustments or personal actions; therefore, age
cannot be used as a health and safety ‘excuse’ to exclude
older workers from the workforce. Older workers are also quite capable
of adapting to change and learning new information, but organisations
may need to convince more experienced workers of the value of any changes
and/or training.”

It adds “older workers should not be excluded from the workforce
on the basis of health and safety, or poor productivity or functioning,
rather organisations will benefit from efforts to maintain the ability
to work of their workers of all ages. Furthermore, the adoption and development
of flexible retirement practices that can retain older workers longer
are likely to have benefits for both the organisation and individual older
worker.”

Some problems, like occupational deafness, can be compounded by an age-related
deterioration in function. The same is the case for osteoarthritis, resulting
from general wear and tear on joints – the attrition caused by excessive
manual handling could change this from aches and pains to disability.

However, noise induced hearing loss is easily preventable – and
given most of us will suffer hearing loss it is something that can and
should be minimised. Manual handling can, properly managed, be undertaken
with no risk, just by using the correct work methods, staffing levels
and lifting aids. Laws place explicit duties on employers to address these
problems.

As we get older eliminating the preventable occupational component of
these and other problems becomes an even more pressing concern.

WOULD
WORK After over 40 years of work, furniture maker Seán
Thompson has no plans to retire. Self-employed, the London School
of Furniture trained craftsman is now based in a share workshop.
He says experience teaches greater caution and a less impetuous
approach to work, but age has its disadvantages as all the aches
and pains accrued throughout life begin to show themselves. Seán
reckons his workshop benefits from young and old working together.
The apprentice, Sam Bourn (rear), can get problems solved and advice
from Seán and other older workers. Seán, who has a
bad back, gets help with carrying and lifting.

Work health is an issue

Work hazards lead to tens of thousands of premature deaths each year,
robbing workers of years of life and frequently quality of life in their
last years.

Accident rates appear to be higher in older workers, at least according
to recent figures. Workplace fatality and major injury rates for workers
aged 55+ were significantly higher in both 2003/04 and 2004/05.(11)

HSE’s figures give a work fatal injury rate for men in the 55-59
age bracket of 1.7 per 100,000 workers in 2003/04, and a provisional figure
for 2004/05 of 1.5. The equivalent male fatality figures for the 60-64
age band is 1.5 in 2003/04 and 2.3 provisionally in 2004/05. The fatality
incidence for all employees was much lower at 1.2 per 100,000 for both
years. The same pattern is seen for non-fatal major injuries. Non-fatal
major injuries for women employees were similarly elevated.

However, HSE’s misconceptions report concludes overall “older
workers do not have more accidents in the workplace.” It adds: “The
accidents associated with older workers such as strains, sprains and falls
can often be prevented by interventions beneficial for all workers, and
older workers may help improve the health and safety culture within organisations
as they often take a more responsible attitude to health and safety risks
based on their number of years experience in the workplace.”

HSE told Hazards the main explanation for the apparent discrepancy
between actual accident figures and the conclusion in the misconceptions
report that there is no elevated risk is that officially reported accident
figures “do not take account of other important explanatory factors
such as occupation and duration of job tenure.”

It adds that a 2005 report for HSE by the Warwick Institute for Employment
Research “shows convincingly that after allowing for such factors
there is no significant difference in injury rate by age.”

The report, ‘Trends and context to rates of workplace injury’,(12)
suggests experience has a clear protective effect, with novices at greatest
risk. It says: “In terms of employment tenure, we estimate that:
After correcting for exposure, those with current employment tenure of
less than a month are almost 400 per cent more likely to have a workplace
injury than those with 20 years or more experience in their current job.”
The report showed in workers aged 20 and over, relative injury risk in
general fell with age, and was lowest in the 45+ age group.

But occupational ill-health is a much more significant cause of harm,
and the longer you’ve spent in the workplace the more likely you
are to be affected. Occupational cancer alone could account for at least
12,000 premature deaths each year, and possible as many as 24,000 deaths
(Hazards 92). The great majority of these are in people in the
60+ age group.

Work-related chronic obstructive airways disease could add another 6,000
deaths. The work contribution to the total circulatory disease toll could
be over 20,000 deaths a year. Both conditions are heavily concentrated
in the older population.

An HSE information sheet on ‘Occupational ill health age statistics’
pulls together data from four reporting schemes and concludes: “Rates
of work-related illnesses are generally higher in older (age 45+) people
of working age.” It adds: “We believe these higher rates are
explained by the automatic tendency for the prevalence rates for persistent
conditions to be greater for older people of working age, and the fact
that the prevalence of conditions due to cumulative exposure to hazards
will tend to increase with age”.(13)

Sheffield University occupational health researcher Simon Pickvance says:
“Most health problems caused by work are more common amongst older
workers. Breathing problems, aches and pains (back problems, RSIs), noise-induced
deafness, hand-arm vibration syndrome.

“Others, such as occupational cancer, have latencies from exposure
to effect, or progress gradually. Some kinds of stress affect people with
young families more than older workers – but others like burnout,
coping with physical illness and caring responsibilities, fear of job
loss or exhaustion affect older workers more.

“So occupational illnesses, as well as general health problems
have to be taken into account in making adaptations at work. Preventing
them from occurring in the first place is a better option.”

The TUC report, arguing for early preventive action, points to the Whitehall
II study of the impact of work on the health of British civil servants
which “famously found that job strain earlier in life is linked
to developing coronary heart disease and common mental health problems,
and that psychosocial factors in the home and the community are also linked
to disease development.”

It also backs “regular health screening, workplace and community-based
health and well-being programmes, ‘plain English’ sources
of advice and information and extra resources for health and safety –
if we want the benefit of such advances to be felt by older workers, we
need to make sure they are available to everyone.”

Work hard then
die

The top causes of death in the UK are the most common work-related
health conditions - cancer, chronic respiratory disease, and circulatory
disease - and the workplace is a substantial contributor to the overall
mortality (deaths) and morbidity (sickness) from these conditions.
All three are conditions that become an increasing problem with age.

A November 2005 report in Hazards(14)
looked at evidence from a wide-range of sources and estimated the
workplace contribution to overall disease incidence (Hazards
92).

Disease
Percentage (%)

work-related


Cancer
8-16


Heart disease
20


Obstructive lung disease
15-20


Asthma
15-20


Musculoskeletal disorders
20

Hazards website

Work cancers
increase with age

More than one in three people in the UK will be diagnosed with cancer
in their lifetime. One in four will die from cancer, almost threequarters
of these over the age of 60. More than a quarter of a million people
in the UK are diagnosed with cancer every year.

The official Health and Safety Executive (HSE) estimate of the
occupational contribution toll is based on a single, discredited,
paper. Hazards last year(15)
revealed a series of fundamental flaws meant this estimate fell
between two and four times short of the real incidence (Hazards
92).

One reason HSE is so far off the mark is the Doll/Peto report on
which its estimate is based was limited to an analysis of deaths
in those under the age of 65. Cancer is primarily a disease of the
old – only 26 per cent of the deaths in England in 2003 were
in people under the age of 60, so it is likely the great majority
of occupational cancers would have been omitted from the figure.

Occupational cancers by definition only occur in those of working
age and above and, because of latency periods before the development
of disease, many are likely to emerge in old age. We have an ageing
population – as other causes of death decline more are likely
to survive long enough to develop their occupational cancers.

Hazards put the work-related cancer toll at between 8
and 16 per cent of all cancers. This would translate to between
12,000 and 24,000 work-related cancer deaths year and between 21,600
and 43,200 new cases, the overwhelming majority in people at least
60 years old.

Hazards
website

Robbed
of retirement

Colin and Sandra Dyal had just celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary
when he died in January 2006. Colin had worked for over 30 years
for Goodyear in the West Midlands. As an instrument technician,
most of his working life was spent in the asbestos riddled boiler
house, providing power to the large tyre plant.

Colin was first told he could have the asbestos cancer mesothelioma
in May 2002, and the diagnosis was confirmed in August. He was 56
(Hazards 94). Colin died just after his 60th birthday on
11 January 2006.

“He was a great man,” said Sandra. “He never
gave up hope. I’m so glad we treasured the days together.
There’s a lot of sorrow at the moment, but I will always have
the memories.”

Several thousand adults die of asbestos cancers in the UK every
year. In 2004 the official death count from mesothelioma, just one
asbestos cancer, was 1,969 cases. Because of the long latency period
before the disease appears, most will be approaching or over retirement
age when the disease is diagnosed. They are robbed of years of life
and quality of life.

Hazards website

Older women, older workers

TUC in 2002 warned that the health and safety of older women was being
neglected.(16)
It called on employers to ask older women workers about the risks they
faced, and for occupational health researchers to become more gender aware.
It also called for unions to encourage older workers to become safety
reps (Hazards 78).

A 2003 report from TUC on women and the menopause(17)
said many women have jobs that could be making menopause related symptoms
worse, and called for employers to provide better welfare facilities,
rest breaks and more forethought and understanding (Hazards 82).

There is also anecdotal evidence that women suffering from asbestos related
cancers face a tougher battle obtaining compensation than men. And women’s
work more commonly includes “emotional labour” and the related
stresses and pressures of caring roles.

But there is very little hard evidence in the literature, because there
has been a dearth of detailed studies. ‘Older women, work and health’,(18)
a November 2006 report from Help the Aged and The Age and Employment Network
(TAEN), commented: “Women now make up nearly half of all employees
in the UK. The female employment rate is about 70 per cent and is increasing
in older age groups. There are one and a half million female workers aged
45–64 and 113,000 over the age of 65. Yet little is known about
the quality of their working lives. At all stages of their working lives
women are more likely than men to work part-time; they are concentrated
in certain areas of employment; they are more likely to be in low-status
jobs; and they earn less than men.”



The report adds: “All these factors influence the well-being of
women workers, especially in the later years of their employment. But
the combination of age and gender discrimination means that few studies
have explored their circumstances or analysed their occupational health
needs.”

It concludes: “Any attempt to promote the health of older women
within the labour force will come up against two types of discriminatory
practice: those against women and those against older workers.”
It calls for “greater age and gender sensitivity in the practices
of the Health and Safety Executive and associated bodies,” with
“the development of an appropriate knowledge base and more appropriate
indicators for monitoring the occupational health of older women.”

Authors Lesley Doyal and Sarah Payne of the School of Policy Studies
at the University of Bristol conclude that greater commitment to age and
gender equality is needed in occupational health research, the organisation
of work, workplace health interventions and in the framing of wider social
policy if the needs of older working women are to be met.

The Help the Aged/TAEN report says changes will be needed in the culture
of the workplace if older women are not to be damaged by psychosocial
aspects of their work. “This will involve giving them greater control
over their working lives. It will also require more effective policies
to facilitate the combination of working lives and care of dependants.”
It says workplace health promotion activities can fail to meet the needs
of older workers in general and older women in particular, problems that
must be addressed.

The report concludes broader public policy initiatives will also be necessary
“if the health needs of older women in employment are to be met,
including a focus on equalising pensions and other benefits that will
enable older women to make health choices about employment.”

Patrick Grattan, chief executive of TAEN, said the report “highlights
a neglected issue. There has been little research on the work and health
of older people, and of older women in particular. And yet the need for
extended working lives in the face of increasing longevity and ageing
populations is not in dispute.

“Employment amongst people in their 50s and 60s is rising, driven
recently by a growth in the number of older working women. Today, 69 per
cent of women aged 50-59 are in paid work and 12 per cent of women aged
60 and over.

“It’s vital that there should be more focus on the needs
and health of older working women, an increasingly important group in
the labour market, if the government is to realise its ambition of adding
a million older people to the workforce.“

CRUSHED
HOPES Mary O'Sullivan's husband died building the new Wembley
Stadium. Patrick O'Sullivan, 54, was killed on 15 January 2004.
Speaking at the unveiling this year of a bronze ‘Building
worker’ statue to commemorate those killed in site tragedies,
Mary said: “He was crushed to death that morning. And they
crushed us to death as well.”

Using the law

Health and safety HSE is clear that health
and safety should not be used as grounds to exclude older workers. However,
risk assessments should ensure they take account of the individual’s
capabilities. They should not make assumptions about supposed capabilities
or frailties.

General safety laws apply and should take into account individual factors
that might affect health and safety, some of which could be related to
age. The Approved Code of Practice to the Management of Health and Safety
at Work Regulations says an employer must “… adapt work to
the individual, as regards to the design of workplaces, the choice of
work equipment and the choice of working and production methods with a
view in particular to alleviating monotonous work and work at a pre-determined
work rate.” Regulation 3 says employers should carry out a “suitable
and sufficient assessment of… the risks to the health and safety
of his employees to which they are exposed while they are at work.”

The management regulations require that risk assessments identify those
groups of workers who may be particularly at risk (www.hse.gov.uk/risk).
In some instances, this may mean giving particular attention to the needs
of older workers. Other regulations covering chemical safety, manual handling,
noise at work, computer use and personal protective equipment all include
risk assessment requirements that should take account of the capability
and needs of the workers undertaking the task, and should endeavour to
wherever possible adapt the work to the individual, for example with regard
to the design of the workplace, the equipment and the working methods
(Hazards 44).

Disability The Disability Discrimination
Act requires employers to carry out reasonable adjustments at work to
help people with disabilities to remain in work. Official figures suggest
45 per cent of people over the age of 50 have a disability as defined
by the law (a long-term health problem limiting normal activities for
a year or more). Adjustments could include retraining, job redesign, offering
an alternative job, changing working hours or providing equipment.

Age discrimination The Employment Equality
(Age) Regulations 2006 apply to anyone who has employees or who enters
into a contract with a person for them to do work. It is now unlawful
to decide not to employ, to dismiss, to refuse to training, to deny promotion,
to give adverse terms and conditions to a worker on grounds of age. Employers
cannot:

* discriminate directly – treat a worker less favourably because
of age, unless objectively justified

* discriminate indirectly – work practices or rules that disadvantage
workers because of age, unless this can be objectively justified

* harass a worker - conduct related to age that violates your dignity
or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive
environment

* victimise a worker - mistreatment where they have made or intend to
make or support a complaint of discrimination on grounds of age

French pensions law protects
workers

Reforms to French pension laws mean employers are now required to
consult with unions on the reduction of the physical strains of the
job. The legal changes, introduced in August 2003, set a three-year
deadline for the consultation.

Under the new system, both sides must meet at least every three
years and discuss working conditions and human resource management
issues, the skills of older workers and work-related strain.

According to a report from the European Working Conditions Observatory
(EWCO), some measures to offset the effects of physically arduous
working conditions - such as bonuses, reduced annual working hours,
and early retirement options - were already in place prior to the
reform law.(19)

However, EWCO says this is the first time there has been an explicit
requirement for action to remedy physical strain. Measures to address
problems could include early retirement or new work organisation
and safety measures to reduce risks.

Making work workable

The TUC is calling on the government and employers to adopt measures
to stop an ageing workforce being pushed out of jobs on to benefits and
early pensions.

TUC’s ‘Ready, willing and able’ report said the problem
of an ageing workforce could not be solved just by raising the state pension
age. That would simply push more older people onto benefits. Instead,
it calls on employers to adopt “age-management strategies”
to retain workers over 50, such as retraining and flexible working.

Specific policies TUC says “might help create greater flexibility”
include:

* Requiring employers to survey their employees to establish the age
profile of their workforce, and then consider with those workers and their
representatives what policies would help workers to remain in employment
for as long as they would want ideally.

* Extending to all employees the right to request flexible working arrangements.
This would challenge the assumption that flexible working is only for
women, and enable workers coming up to retirement to “downshift”
gradually.

* A right to retraining for older workers, with paid time off work to
learn new skills. Judicious subsidies could encourage employers to welcome
this.

* DWP advice on retirement planning, offered periodically, starting several
years ahead of state pension age.

* Partial retirement - the ability to move to reduced hours, and supplement
lower wages with a part-time pension. Finland and Sweden have introduced
part-time sick pay for workers suffering from long-term ill health - workers
who have been off ill for a long time can return to pay on a part-time
basis, and receive partial sick pay as well.

Flexibility of itself is no panacea, and has to be introduced sensitively.
A 2004 paper in the Journal of Occupational Health and Safety –
Australia and New Zealand noted flexibility can provide scope for
graduated exits and post-retirement options for older workers.(20)

On the other hand, it said flexibility can also entail a loss of job/income
security that is vital to retirement planning. It can also entail increased
work intensity leading to early burnout and premature retirement as well
as a need to modify “fitness for work” models/parameters and
to recalibrate workloads and hazard exposure limits for older workers
given general health changes associated with ageing, especially in context
of less regulated and longer working hours.

A 2005 report from The Work Foundation, ‘The ageing workforce’,
noted: “Organisations, who are already open to the well-being debates,
might want to think about the health status of their employees and what
role they can play as workers move into retirement. Good health is heralded
as ‘one of the cornerstones of well-being in later life’.”(21)

It points to a 2005 paper from the universities of Edinburgh and Kent,
‘Older workers and options for flexible work’, which says
quality of work must be a consideration because “work can have a
negative impact on health through stress, depressed wages, and poor-quality
jobs in terms of hours or working conditions.”(22)

The Work Foundation report says: “Part of the solution to this
will be for organisations to think about how they can fit jobs to older
workers through a changed conception of work itself, as well as promoting
occupational health and work-life balance.[23]
This might include simple changes such as moving manual workers into more
administrative posts.”

Conclusions

The improving health and longevity in the UK population means the great
majority of workers have no significant health impediments to prevent
work up to the age of 65 and for many, where they wish, beyond. And the
UK’s ageing workforce means these workers will be essential to business,
the economy and wider society.

Older workers, however, are being denied access to work on spurious health
and even health and safety grounds. There is no credible reason for these
exclusions.

That is not to say that an age “blind” approach is required.
Age does impact on capability and health status does change with age.
A lifetime of exposure to workplace risks can take its toll too. However,
these effects can be minimised and better managed.

Specific measures at a policy and workplace level can help older workers
remain healthy and productive longer. If government targets for increased
employment of older workers are to be met, it will require new “work
ability” approaches from employers, including occupational health
and safety programmes and workplace level “age management strategies”.
Greater government resources and support for these initiatives are necessary,
at least until approaches are have been properly honed and established.

There is a case for introducing an explicit legal duty on employers under
the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations, requiring assessment
of jobs to see that job tasks take proper account of the physical capabilities
of workers, with a particular focus on older workers and any possible
adaptations, job redesign, changes in work hours or schedules or reassignment
that might be beneficial. The UK already has a similar safety regulation
tailored to younger workers.(24)
France has a law requiring periodic review of measures by employers to
address the impact of physical strains at work on the employability of
older workers, with an explicit requirement to remedy problems identified.

Law or not, age management strategies should be introduced at a workplace
level and must target “ageing” rather than just “older”
workers. Planning occupational health interventions and devising job redesign
or alternative work in good time, with policies looking at workers in
the 45+ age group, will provide greater scope for creating suitable and
healthy work transitions. Career structures should allow a shift to more
suitable work, where necessary or desirable.

The UK’s long hours culture and the intensification of work, with
fewer workers expected to do more, is detrimental to both health and productivity.
The cumulative harm caused by overwork is likely to disadvantage older
workers. Employers should introduce sensible working hours practices,
adhering to the Working Time Regulations, and should eliminate excessive
work rates. The health and safety enforcement agencies, led by the Health
and Safety Executive, should take action to ensure harmful and excessive
working hours and work pace are recognised as genuine and illegal health
and safety concerns and are enforcement and prevention priorities.

Strategies must also consider gender issues. The health of women workers,
and particularly older women workers, has been neglected in occupational
health research, in preventive strategies and in approaches by statutory
health and safety agencies. There are many gender-related workplace factors
ranging from type of work, to health issues to work-life balance that
should be considered when considering the employability of older workers.

A new emphasis on occupational health, integrated into board level strategy
decisions, is necessary to ensure long-term health problems caused by
work are not treated as “tomorrow’s problem”. The problem
is today; it is the price paid by the company, the worker and wider society
that comes later. Effective implementation of workplace age management
strategies will required training of managers and supervisors and a new
mind set, focused on maintaining the positive contribution of older workers.

Failure on the part of employers to make any efforts to accommodate older
workers could constitute age or disability discrimination. Workers, unions
and other advocates should make sure they use age and disability discrimination
laws effectively to ensure employers at least meet their minimum legal
duties.

Extension to older workers of the “right to ask” for flexible
working arrangements would enable older workers to consider alternative
work patterns better suited to their capabilities and responsibilities,
including the possibility of “sunsetting”, a gradual reduction
in work up to retirement. Workers should not be denied safety or vocational
training because of their age.

Older workers are less of a sickness problem to employers than the workforce
as a whole. They are more likely to take periods of long-term sick leave,
however, so sickness policies should allow time off to manage chronic
health problems.

Physical fitness in older workers is strongly related to continued fitness
to work. Employers can support older workers remaining fit and healthy
by providing time, resources and access to facilities for participation
in healthy activities inside and outside the workplace.

Official health and safety agencies must be fully involved in overseeing
implementation of ageing workforce policies and practices. The Health
and Safety Executive (HSE) must be provided additional resources to develop
advice, guidance and enforcement approaches tailored to ensuring the continued
productive and healthy employment of older workers.

Occupational health is not just about the health of the worker. It is
about the right to healthy and productive retirement. Poor working conditions
are stealing healthy retirement years from workers. Occupational health
research and policy must not be limited to ensuring work remains healthy.
Both must ensure full consideration is giving to minimising the impact
of occupation-related injury and disability in retirement.

Finally, health and safety and the older worker must be a core issue
for trade unions. Unions should develop policy on occupational health
and safety and the ageing worker. At workplace level, older workers’
health and safety should be raised at workplace health and safety committees,
and should be discussed with members. All terms and conditions negotiations
should consider the impact on older workers. Unions should also investigate
measures to maintain contact with retired members so the real extent of
work-related health problems are recognised and acted upon, and affected
retired members are provided the necessary support and compensation.

Safety reps’ checklist

Has your workplace got an age policy?
It should have. And it should make sure age is not an issue neglected
by either the union or the employer.

Union
safety Make sure age policy and issues is not overlooked
at safety committee meetings. Ensure safety reps are consulted about
all issues relating to the recruitment, training and employment
of older workers.

Training Workers
should not be denied vocational or safety training because of their
age. Training should allow older workers to prepare for work that
is appropriate to their skills and capabilities.

Suitable work
Career structures should allow older workers to move away from work
that is a particular risk for them as they get older to work that
uses their skills, experience and capabilities.

Flexible work
Flexible working practices may allow older workers to reduce their
working hours, or to arrange their working hours around caring commitments
or preparation for retirement. Examples would include “sunsetting”,
a phased hours reduction in the years leading to retirement.

Sickness absence
Policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

Health and safety
Risk assessments will always take into account particular
susceptibility to injury or illness of individuals. Older workers
who may have particular needs and susceptibilities must be consulted
directly.

Payment schemes
Where pay is based on meeting production targets, these should not
lead to disadvantage because of age-related factors.

Work rates
Are work rates and hours excessive and bad for health? Unions should
ensure agreed work patterns are not harmful and do not lead to difficulties
or disadvantage for older workers.



Health promotion Opportunities should
be provided to help employees to maintain their ability to work,
through exercise or addressing physical health problems.

Pension schemes
Company pension schemes should not result in pressure to work longer
hours in the years preceding retirement.

Gender issues
Have health and safety issues affecting older women been given specific
attention? A gender neutral approach can neglect differences in
the types of jobs and pressures faced sometime by women and men
at work.

Consultation
All age-sensitive policies and issues should be negotiated with
the involvement of older workers and union reps.

Worker involvement
Unions should ensure older workers are properly involved and consulted
on union and workplace matters.

Retired members
Safety reps should endeavour to ensure information on work-related
ill-health suffered by retired members is collated, so the true
extent of the problems caused by work is ascertained. Retired members
should be provided advice and assistance about possible compensation
claims for work-related ill-health.

References

1. Facts and misconceptions about age, health status and employability.
Report Number HSL/2005/20. [pdf]

2. Ready,
willing and able, TUC, August 2006.

3. Health, work and well-being – Caring for our future.
ISBN: 1-84388-608-4. HM Government, October 2005. DWP news release and
full report [pdf].
DWP
news release 19 October 2005.

4. First findings of the European Working Conditions Survey: Working
conditions in Europe – what workers say. European
Foundation news release, 7 November 2006. Fourth
European Working Conditions Survey (2005). European
Foundation survey 2000, question on “sustainability of work.”

5. Attitude not age, Employers’ Forum on Age, September
2005. EFA
publications webpage.

6. Is work good for your health and well-being?, DWP, September
2006. DWP
news release. Health,
work and well-being webpages and executive
summary of the report and [pdf].
Full report
[pdf]

7. Juhani Ilmarinen. Ageing
workers, Occupational and Environmental Medicine, volume 58, page
546, 2001.

8. Juhani Ilmarinen. The
ageing workforce - challenges for occupational health, Occupational
Medicine, volume 56, pages 362-364, 2006.

9. Employment
initiatives for an ageing workforce in the EU15, European Foundation,
2006 [pdf]

10. Position paper on age and employment, Faculty of Occupational
Medicine of the Royal College of Physicians, August 2004. [pdf]

11. HSE age
and gender accident statistics, 2003/04 and 2004/05 (provisional)

Table 11a:
Injuries to men employees by age of injured person and severity of injury,
2003/04 - 2004/05p.

Table 11b:
Injuries to women employees by age of injured person and severity of injury,
2003/04 - 2004/05p.

12. Trends and context to rates of workplace injury, HSE
Research Report RR386, 2005 and [pdf]

13. Occupational
ill health age statistics: Information sheet, HSE.

14. A job to die for?,
Hazards, number 92, October-December 2005.

15. Burying the evidence,
Hazards 92, October-December 2005.

16. Health and work in older women: a neglected issue, TUC/Pennell
Institute, 2002. TUC
news release

17. Working through the change: health and safety and the menopause,
TUC, 2003 [pdf]

18. Older women, work and health, Help the Aged and The Age
and Employment Network (TAEN), November 2006. News
release. [pdf]

19. Managing physical strain at work, EWCO
news pages, 13 August 2004.

Gilles M, Guérin F and Rousseau T, Réduire la pénibilité
au travail (Reduce physical strain at work) in Travail et changement (Work
and change), ANACT, No. 294, Feb/Mar 2004. [in
French].

20. Callaghan K, Francis M and Gorman D. Editorial: Age and employment,
Journal of Occupational Health and Safety – Australia and New Zealand,
vol.20, pages 291-295, 2004.

21. Natalie Turner and Laura Williams. The ageing workforce,
The Work Foundation, 2005. [pdf]

22. Loretto W, Vickerstaff S and White P, Older workers and Options
for Flexible Work, Working Paper Series No 31, Universities of Edinburgh
and Kent, 2005

23. Hirsch B, Macpherson D and Hardy M, Occupational age structure
and access for older workers, Industrial
and Labour Relations Review, Vol 53 No 3, pp401–418, 2000.

24. Too young to
die, Hazards, Number 95, July-September 2006.

Other sources

European
Foundation ageing workforce case studies

Age
and working conditions in the European Union, European Foundation,
2003.

Foundation
Focus - Issue 2: Age and employment, European Foundation, September
2006.

Employment in Europe, European Commission, October 2003.

Summary document [pdf]
or and full report [pdf].

ACAS Age
in the workplace advice leaflet. ACAS helpline on 08457 47 47 47.

Occupational health and safety issues and for the older worker,
New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services, USA, December 2003
[pdf]

Why
should a workplace look at issues concerning ageing workers?, CCOHS
factsheet, Canada, 2002.

Older workers: living longer, working longer, DELSA newsletter
issue 2, OECD, 2006. [pdf]

Relevant websites

Hazards age webpages

Hazards work and health webpages

TUC workSMART ten point
age regulation myth-buster

HSE
age and gender statistics

FIOH
‘Ageing and work’ webpages

European
Foundation ‘age’ webpages

European
Foundation ‘Ageing and work’ webpages.

TAEN – The Age and Employment
Network, 207-221 Pentonville Road, London N1 9UZ. Tel: 020 7843 1590.

Agebusters website

DWP’s
Age Positive project

Employers Forum on
Age (EFA)

HAZARDS
MAGAZINE • WORKERS' HEALTH INTERNATIONAL NEWS

There is no safe reason to discriminate on age grounds

Not dead yet

We all have different strengths and weaknesses, young and old. And properly designed work should be safe and healthy whoever is doing it. So why are older workers told they are no longer up to the job? Hazards editor Rory O’Neill spells out the measures necessary to deliver healthier workplaces for all, regardless of age.

Not dead yet
Executive summary

• Improving health and longevity mean the great majority of workers have no significant health impediments to prevent work up to the age of 65 and for many, where they wish, beyond.

• Workplace health and safety considerations are not a valid reason to prevent older workers continuing in work.

• Age discrimination legislation can and should be used to challenge dismissal or failure to recruit or train older workers on spurious “health and safety” grounds.

• If government targets for increased employment of older workers are to be met, it will require new “work ability” approaches from employers, including occupational health and safety programmes and workplace level “age management strategies”. These programmes should attract government support.

• There is a case for introducing an explicit legal duty on employers under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations, requiring assessment of jobs to see that job tasks take proper account of the physical capabilities of workers, with a particular focus on older workers and any possible adaptations, job redesign, changes in work hours or schedules or reassignment that might be beneficial. The UK already has a similar safety regulation tailored to younger workers. France has a law requiring periodic review of measures by employers to address the impact of physical strains at work on the employability of older workers, with an explicit requirement to remedy problems identified.

• Age management strategies must target “ageing” rather than just “older” workers. Planning occupational health interventions and devising job redesign or alternative work in good time, with policies looking at workers in the 45+ age group, will provide greater scope for creating suitable and healthy work transitions. Career structures should allow a shift to more suitable work, where necessary or desirable.

• Extension to older workers of the “right to ask” for flexible working arrangements would enable older workers to consider alternative work patterns better suited to their capabilities and responsibilities, including the possibility of “sunsetting”, a gradual reduction in work up to retirement.

• Workers should not be denied safety or vocational training because of their age.

• Payment schemes based on productivity should not lead to unhealthy work rates, or work patterns and speeds that disadvantage older workers. Pension schemes should not result in pressure to work longer hours in the years preceding retirement.

• Older workers in the UK are more likely to be economically inactive on grounds of disability than in most other developed nations, suggesting far greater emphasis must be placed on providing support, “reasonable adjustments” and other measures to accommodate people with disabilities in the workplace. Disability discrimination legislation must be effectively applied.

• Older workers are less of a sickness problem to employers than the workforce as a whole. They are more likely to take periods of long-term sick leave, however, so sickness policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

• The Health and Safety Executive must be provided additional resources to develop advice, guidance and enforcement approaches tailored to ensuring the continued productive and healthy employment of older workers.

• Impact of work on the health and employability of older women workers is particularly neglected. Ensuring statutory, research, employer and union strategies are age and gender sensitive is crucial to ensuring the “work ability” of older women workers.

• The impact of health problems related to ageing, for example hearing loss and osteoarthritis, can be minimised if health and safety laws are observed and adequately enforced, minimising any work-related component or exacerbation of the condition.

• The UK’s long hours culture and the intensification of work, with fewer workers expected to do more, is detrimental to both health and productivity. The cumulative harm caused by overwork is likely to disadvantage older workers. Employers should introduce sensible working hours practices, adhering to the Working Time Regulations, and should eliminate excessive work rates. The health and safety enforcement agencies should take action to ensure harmful and excessive working hours and work pace are eliminated.

• Workplace injury and ill-health rates in older workers need explicit attention from statutory agencies including the Health and Safety Executive. Most of the major causes of work-related mortality and morbidity in the UK are more common in older workers. Work hazards lead to tens of thousands of premature deaths every year.

• Occupational health is not just about the health of the worker. It is about the right to healthy and productive retirement. Poor working conditions are stealing healthy retirement years from workers. The three top causes of death in the UK – cancer, chronic respiratory disease and circulatory disease – all have a substantial, preventable, occupational component. Occupational health research and policy must not be limited to ensuring work remains healthy. Both must ensure full consideration is giving to minimising the impact of occupation-related injury and disability in retirement.

• The UK has dropped down Europe's ranking from being the nation whose workers believed they were most likely to be up to their job at age 60, to sixth behind Germany, The Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Finland.

• Employers are not doing enough to accommodate effectively an ageing workforce. More than 1 million workers are struggling to find employment because of their age. Employers are not providing the necessary training and flexibility to retain their existing older workers.

• A new emphasis on occupational health, integrated into board level strategy decisions, is necessary to ensure long-term health problems caused by work are not treated as “tomorrow’s problem”. The problem is today; it is the price paid by the company, the worker and society as a whole that comes later.

• Effective implementation of workplace age management strategies will required training of managers and supervisors and a new mind set, focused on maintaining the positive contribution of older workers.

• Physical fitness in older workers is strongly related to continued fitness to work. Employers can support older workers remaining fit and healthy by providing time, resources and access to facilities for participation in healthy activities inside and outside the workplace.

• Unions should develop policy on occupational health and safety and the ageing worker. At workplace level, older workers’ health and safety should be raised at workplace health and safety committees, and should be discussed with members. Terms and conditions negotiations should consider the impact on older workers.

• Retired workers should not be neglected. Occupational health research must take full account of excess mortality and morbidity in former workers. Unions should investigate measures to maintain contact with retired members so the real extent of work-related health problems are recognised and acted upon, and affected retired members are provided the necessary support and compensation.


Not dead yet

At retirement age, the great majority of us are in full working order. We are living longer, and we are healthier longer. The average person in the UK can expect almost a decade in good health after the age of 65. Work, for most, is something older workers are willing and able up to and sometimes beyond the usual retirement age. Sometimes its only prejudice that stands in the way.

A 2005 report for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) looked at “the common 'myths' about older workers and provides, where possible, evidence and arguments that aim to dispel inaccurate perceptions about older adults and demonstrate that health and safety cannot be used as an ‘excuse’ to justify the exclusion of older workers.”

‘Facts and misconceptions about age, health status and employability’(1) concludes “there is no health and safety justification to exclude older workers from the workforce. Organisations will benefit from efforts to maintain the ability to work of all employees at any age and the adoption and development of flexible retirement practices that retain older workers longer.”

But many firms are not making that effort. ‘Ready, willing and able’, an August 2006 TUC report,(2) revealed that more than a million workers from Britain’s post-war baby boom generation are struggling to find employment because of their age.

Employers are reluctant to recruit older workers or provide the necessary training and flexibility to retain those they already have despite their desire to continue working, the TUC said in its report. According to the TUC, more than a third of the 2.6 million people aged between 50 and 65 who are unemployed or economically inactive would prefer to be working. Some 250,000 said they were looking for a job while another 750,000 said they would like to have one.

The report attacks the idea that the post-war baby boomers are opting to retire early. It says only a third of those who retire early do so entirely voluntarily.

The TUC's deputy general secretary, Frances O'Grady, said: “Most baby boomers are not retiring early to cruise round the world or go bungee jumping. They are being dumped out of work and on to the scrapheap and are scraping by on benefits or small work pensions.”


Work injury forces octagenarian’s retirement

A Sheffield octogenarian has had to give up work after sustaining a serious workplace injury. John Moffatt, 80, received a £5,000 out-of-court settlement from his former employer in November 2006 after suffering the shoulder injury at work.

Mr Moffatt was working part-time as a general handyman for Flex-Seal Couplings in Barnsley at the time of accident, in January 2005. His boot became caught as he manoeuvred a hydraulic pump truck full of empty pallets, causing him to fall heavily. He said: “I was in immediate pain and felt badly shaken and dazed. I tried to pull myself up but was unable to do so because of the pain so had to sit for about 10 minutes before managing to get myself up and see a colleague who took me to the first aid room.”

A series of hospital visits determined Mr Moffatt had suffered muscle damage known as a rotator cuff tear and at some point may need a shoulder replacement. He was also told that he would never regain the full use of his arm. He now needs assistance around the house with things such as DIY and decorating. He commented: “The thing I miss the most is not being able to go ballroom dancing with my wife as this is something we have both done for many years and thoroughly enjoy.”

His legal adviser, Lynne Parker, of personal injury firm Irwin Mitchell, said: “Mr Moffatt really enjoyed the continued independence of working and has been robbed of the chance of being able to work until the age of 80 as he had planned. He was never given any training in respect of use of the pump truck or manual handling.” She added: “Employers need to realise the duty of care they owe to their entire workforce, be they full or part time employees the duty is the same.”





Myths and misconceptions

HSE’s misconceptions report(1) adds detail on the “common ‘myths’ about age, health status and employment” that might be used to justify discrimination:

Myth Chronological age determines health and age brings illness and disease.
Myth Getting older is associated with a loss of cognitive capacity.
Myth Older workers have less physical strength and endurance.
Myth Older workers tend to have poorer sensory abilities such as sight and hearing.
Myth Older workers have more time off sick.
Myth Older workers have difficulty adapting to change.
Myth Older workers find it hard to learn new information making their knowledge and skills outdated.
Myth Older workers have more accidents in the workplace.
Myth Older workers are less productive.



Work capability

The government’s October 2005 ‘Health, work and well-being’ strategy (Hazards 93), includes among its objectives “working with employers to make changes in the workplace necessary to allow people to work to a later age.” It adds that among indicators of strategy success would be “people being able to work longer if they wish.”(3)

A new law barring age discrimination in the workplace law should help. Safety minister Lord Hunt said the Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006, which came into effect on 1 October 2006, would ensure older workers are not denied the opportunity to stay in work. He said: “Research has shown that being out of work is bad for your health, but more importantly being in work is positively good for your health. That is why the new age discrimination laws are so important.”

First findings of the European Foundation’s 2005 survey, published in November 2006, show that workers saying they believed they would be able to do the same job when 60 was at 63.5 per cent in the UK, just above the EU15 average of 61 per cent and the expanded EU25 figure of 58.9 per cent. This represents a significant slip down the rankings. The UK now trails behind Germany (73.6 per cent), The Netherlands (71.2 per cent), Sweden (69.7 per cent), Denmark (68.8 per cent) and Finland (65.2 per cent)(4).

Of the EU15 countries investigated in the previous 2000 European Working Conditions Survey, UK workers were the most likely to believe they’d be able to do the same job at 60 years of age (60.3 per cent compared to an EU15 average of 53.9 per cent). By 2005, the UK had fallen to sixth in the EU15 ranking, in the middle rather than at the head of the pack. The European Working Conditions Survey 2005 involved interviews with almost 30,000 workers in Europe, including over 1,000 in the UK.

And a September 2005 UK study by the Employers' Forum on Age found that almost half the workforce would be happy to work until they are 70, but only one in five thought they would be fit enough to do so.(5)

It is the government’s intention to see more older people in work. Launching ‘Is work good for your health and well-being?’, a September 2006 Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) report on the net positive impact of working on health,(6) DWP said its welfare reforms include reducing “the number of people who need to rely on incapacity benefits by 1 million, and help 1 million older workers and more than 300,000 lone parents into work.”


Not fit to work?

Workers reporting they believed they would be able to do the same job at 60.
Euro ranking

2000 (%)

2005 (%)
1

UK (60.3)

Germany (73.6)
2

Austria (58.6)

The Netherlands (71.2)
3

The Netherlands (58.4)

Sweden (69.7)
4

Denmark (58.3)

Denmark (68.8)
5

Germany (58.0)

Finland (65.2)
6

Finland (57.6)

UK (63.5)
7

Italy (55.2)

Italy (59.9) [=7]
8

Ireland (54.7)

Austria (59.9) [=7]
9

Sweden (54.6)

Greece (58.8)
10

Spain (52.8)

Luxembourg (54.4)
11

Luxembourg (52.6)

Spain (53.5)
12

Belgium (49.4)

Ireland (53.2)
13

Greece (48.4)

Belgium (52.3)
14

Portugal (43.6)

France (48.6)
15

France (40.2)

Portugal (47.5)

Source Statistical comparisons from European Foundation Surveys 2000 and 2005 [pdf]



Better work, all ages

The aim of age awareness at work should be to achieve:

• Working conditions that will avoid disabling diseases in the long-term
• Healthy work that does not put older people at special risk
• Job redesign so that older people can work for longer within their physical and mental capacities
• Opportunities throughout working life to improve skills through training and physical fitness through exercise


Full working order

Just because someone is more likely to go grey, doesn’t mean they are more likely to go sick. HSE’s misconceptions report(1) notes: “Older workers do not take more time off work. Older workers have been found to show lower levels of short term/non-certified sickness absence than young workers, which is the biggest source of absence and disruption for employers… A higher risk of absence from work amongst older workers is not supported by the evidence and therefore is not a valid reason to exclude them from the workforce.”

Finland has led the way on measures to accommodate older workers through “maintaining work ability”, a project driven by the official health and safety agency. Professor Juhani Ilmarinen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health (FIOH) points out that regular physical exercise can keep a worker’s physical capacity “nearly unchanged” between the ages of 45 and 65. He says an older worker taking regular physical exercise is likely to be fitter than younger colleagues who have not exercised.

Ilmarinen says policies should look at ageing workers rather than older workers, starting with those as young as 45. He says: “The main reason for this ‘early’ definition of ageing among workers from the occupational health point of view is that it gives better possibility for preventive measures.”(7)

Older workers, regardless of their ability, are unfairly labelled as unsuited to changes in work, he says. “It has been often incorrectly argued that their competency is no longer sufficient and their experiences are less valid. However, the major reason has often been the uncontrolled changes that have occurred in work and the lack of adjustments urgently needed for fitting their resources to the new work demands. The common need to blame the worker should be redirected towards those responsible for planning and carrying out changes at work, who overlook the need for adjustments.”

However, the issue of disability cannot be dodged if a strategy is to increase “work ability” of older workers. This is particularly true in the UK.

TUC’s ‘Ready willing and able’ report(2) warned “of people aged between 50 and state pension age, 40-45 per cent have suffered from a health problem in the last year and poor health is the commonest reason for having left one’s job.”

It is not that older workers are not up to work. The TUC report says employment levels for men and women in the 50+ age group is higher than among 16-24 year olds. The UK has one of Europe’s highest proportions of older workers in work, trailing only Sweden and Denmark. The average age when UK workers leave the workforce is 63 years. And sickness absence rates in the UK, suggest if anything older workers are less likely to take sick leave.

But the report says: “Employment outcomes are very closely linked to disability for older people. Compared to the average for both the EU and the OECD older people in the UK are more likely to be economically inactive because of disability, and this is especially true for men in their early 60s.

“Older workers who are not disabled have very similar employment rates to non-disabled prime age workers, but there is a significant decline for older disabled people. What is more, the disadvantage faced by disabled people increases for older groups - while the employment of prime age disabled people is 71 per cent of that for their non-disabled coevals, this ratio worsens for older groups, and is just 52 per cent for those aged 60 - 64.”


Job and Finnish

Professor Juhani Ilmarinen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Safety and Health says “the following single actions can improve work ability during ageing:

• training of supervisors for age management
• implementation of age ergonomics
• worksite exercise programmes
• tailored training new technology.”

He says: “The results are better if several actions are integrated. The consequences of improved work ability can be measured as better productivity and quality of work and the better well-being and life quality of ageing workers.”(7)

An Occupational Medicine editorial in September 2006 by Professor Ilmarinen(8) called for a four step solution to “the ageing challenge”.

• Attitudes towards ageing must be changed.
• The knowledge level of managers and supervisors in age-related issues needs to be improved.
• Better age-adjusted and flexible working life is needed.
• Health care services should meet the increasing needs of older workers.

The paper calls for action to address problems with management approaches and work hazards.

“The concept focuses on both human resources and working conditions. The core dimensions of human resources include health, physical and mental capabilities and social functioning, competencies, as well as attitudes and values. The core dimensions of work cover the contents and demands of work, physical, ergonomic and psychosocial work environment, as well as management and leadership issues.”

One Finnish initiative, the VETO programme, focuses on developing the activities of institutions, such as occupational safety and health inspectorates, occupational health service providers and rehabilitation institutes, which help workplaces to manage employee retention issues, well-being and rehabilitation. The programme maintains an individual’s ability to work and employment prospects.(9)



Early work exposures, later problems

Jim Marshall started work in engineering in 1963, aged 16. Within three years he had developed varicose veins from constant standing at work on hard floors. After 20 years in the industry, working as a lathe operative, he gave up engineering for good. But he still has the varicose veins to remind him of the job. The problem was eased in 1991 when he had an operation to remove the veins, but was not resolved completely. “No other members of my family have ever had varicose veins and it is now too late for me to do anything to prevent them,” he told Hazards in 2005. “The problem is that having veins removed when you are relatively young means that others could develop and there are a finite number in your legs. This could lead to serious problems in later life.”

More on the Hazards ‘Standing problems’ webpages


Prejudice is the problem

Even where age does take a toll a person’s physical capabilities, it is prejudice and not problems that have made this an employment issue. The small deterioration expected with age is much smaller than the range of differences that exist across the entire workforce. An older worker whose eyesight and physical strength are not what they were, might still be fitter and more capable and than a day-one working teenager.

Occupational health researcher Simon Pickvance of Sheffield University told Hazards: “Much is made of how the ability to work declines with age. Physical strength, stamina, eyesight, hearing, for example, certainly do decline. But the key thing to remember is that in most cases, the average decline is by a few percentage points over the last 15 years of working life, but the range of performance amongst younger workers is much larger; looking after most young workers will also accommodate most older workers too.

“There are areas – particularly heavy manual work, especially for women over 50 – where older workers are at a special disadvantage and alternative work is essential for almost all, but there are also areas where older workers have particular advantages; more experience, more able to weigh up alternatives effectively, less likely to show signs of exhaustion, and having more commitment to the job.”

The Faculty of Occupational Medicine makes as similar point: “Although natural ageing does result in physiological change, which can affect work capacity especially in motor and visual bodily systems, cognition is not significantly impaired in the age ranges that span working life. Variation in performance within a specific age group far exceeds the change in performance associated with ageing. In addition, older workers often have accumulated experience or learning strategies that may be valuable in contributing to business success. The published literature does not support the popular misconception that work performance declines with age.”(10) It adds: In practice, despite an age related decline in physical strength, stamina, memory and information processing, this rarely impairs work performance.”

Simon Pickvance says the problem is not with the workers, but with the work practices. “Over the last 30 years older workers have been edged out of work, as employers have looked for the super-fit to work flat out for long hours. Long hours and intense work have increased in UK almost uniquely in Europe – so older workers are at a particular disadvantage in the labour market.”

HSE’s misconceptions report notes: “Declines in health or cognitive, physical or sensory functioning can be minimised, prevented or overcome by simple adjustments or personal actions; therefore, age cannot be used as a health and safety ‘excuse’ to exclude older workers from the workforce. Older workers are also quite capable of adapting to change and learning new information, but organisations may need to convince more experienced workers of the value of any changes and/or training.”

It adds “older workers should not be excluded from the workforce on the basis of health and safety, or poor productivity or functioning, rather organisations will benefit from efforts to maintain the ability to work of their workers of all ages. Furthermore, the adoption and development of flexible retirement practices that can retain older workers longer are likely to have benefits for both the organisation and individual older worker.”

Some problems, like occupational deafness, can be compounded by an age-related deterioration in function. The same is the case for osteoarthritis, resulting from general wear and tear on joints – the attrition caused by excessive manual handling could change this from aches and pains to disability.

However, noise induced hearing loss is easily preventable – and given most of us will suffer hearing loss it is something that can and should be minimised. Manual handling can, properly managed, be undertaken with no risk, just by using the correct work methods, staffing levels and lifting aids. Laws place explicit duties on employers to address these problems.

As we get older eliminating the preventable occupational component of these and other problems becomes an even more pressing concern.


WOULD WORK After over 40 years of work, furniture maker Seán Thompson has no plans to retire. Self-employed, the London School of Furniture trained craftsman is now based in a share workshop. He says experience teaches greater caution and a less impetuous approach to work, but age has its disadvantages as all the aches and pains accrued throughout life begin to show themselves. Seán reckons his workshop benefits from young and old working together. The apprentice, Sam Bourn (rear), can get problems solved and advice from Seán and other older workers. Seán, who has a bad back, gets help with carrying and lifting.


Work health is an issue

Work hazards lead to tens of thousands of premature deaths each year, robbing workers of years of life and frequently quality of life in their last years.

Accident rates appear to be higher in older workers, at least according to recent figures. Workplace fatality and major injury rates for workers aged 55+ were significantly higher in both 2003/04 and 2004/05.(11)

HSE’s figures give a work fatal injury rate for men in the 55-59 age bracket of 1.7 per 100,000 workers in 2003/04, and a provisional figure for 2004/05 of 1.5. The equivalent male fatality figures for the 60-64 age band is 1.5 in 2003/04 and 2.3 provisionally in 2004/05. The fatality incidence for all employees was much lower at 1.2 per 100,000 for both years. The same pattern is seen for non-fatal major injuries. Non-fatal major injuries for women employees were similarly elevated.

However, HSE’s misconceptions report concludes overall “older workers do not have more accidents in the workplace.” It adds: “The accidents associated with older workers such as strains, sprains and falls can often be prevented by interventions beneficial for all workers, and older workers may help improve the health and safety culture within organisations as they often take a more responsible attitude to health and safety risks based on their number of years experience in the workplace.”

HSE told Hazards the main explanation for the apparent discrepancy between actual accident figures and the conclusion in the misconceptions report that there is no elevated risk is that officially reported accident figures “do not take account of other important explanatory factors such as occupation and duration of job tenure.”

It adds that a 2005 report for HSE by the Warwick Institute for Employment Research “shows convincingly that after allowing for such factors there is no significant difference in injury rate by age.”

The report, ‘Trends and context to rates of workplace injury’,(12) suggests experience has a clear protective effect, with novices at greatest risk. It says: “In terms of employment tenure, we estimate that: After correcting for exposure, those with current employment tenure of less than a month are almost 400 per cent more likely to have a workplace injury than those with 20 years or more experience in their current job.” The report showed in workers aged 20 and over, relative injury risk in general fell with age, and was lowest in the 45+ age group.

But occupational ill-health is a much more significant cause of harm, and the longer you’ve spent in the workplace the more likely you are to be affected. Occupational cancer alone could account for at least 12,000 premature deaths each year, and possible as many as 24,000 deaths (Hazards 92). The great majority of these are in people in the 60+ age group.

Work-related chronic obstructive airways disease could add another 6,000 deaths. The work contribution to the total circulatory disease toll could be over 20,000 deaths a year. Both conditions are heavily concentrated in the older population.

An HSE information sheet on ‘Occupational ill health age statistics’ pulls together data from four reporting schemes and concludes: “Rates of work-related illnesses are generally higher in older (age 45+) people of working age.” It adds: “We believe these higher rates are explained by the automatic tendency for the prevalence rates for persistent conditions to be greater for older people of working age, and the fact that the prevalence of conditions due to cumulative exposure to hazards will tend to increase with age”.(13)

Sheffield University occupational health researcher Simon Pickvance says: “Most health problems caused by work are more common amongst older workers. Breathing problems, aches and pains (back problems, RSIs), noise-induced deafness, hand-arm vibration syndrome.

“Others, such as occupational cancer, have latencies from exposure to effect, or progress gradually. Some kinds of stress affect people with young families more than older workers – but others like burnout, coping with physical illness and caring responsibilities, fear of job loss or exhaustion affect older workers more.

“So occupational illnesses, as well as general health problems have to be taken into account in making adaptations at work. Preventing them from occurring in the first place is a better option.”

The TUC report, arguing for early preventive action, points to the Whitehall II study of the impact of work on the health of British civil servants which “famously found that job strain earlier in life is linked to developing coronary heart disease and common mental health problems, and that psychosocial factors in the home and the community are also linked to disease development.”

It also backs “regular health screening, workplace and community-based health and well-being programmes, ‘plain English’ sources of advice and information and extra resources for health and safety – if we want the benefit of such advances to be felt by older workers, we need to make sure they are available to everyone.”


Work hard then die

The top causes of death in the UK are the most common work-related health conditions - cancer, chronic respiratory disease, and circulatory disease - and the workplace is a substantial contributor to the overall mortality (deaths) and morbidity (sickness) from these conditions. All three are conditions that become an increasing problem with age.

A November 2005 report in Hazards(14) looked at evidence from a wide-range of sources and estimated the workplace contribution to overall disease incidence (Hazards 92).
Disease
Percentage (%)
work-related
Cancer
8-16
Heart disease
20
Obstructive lung disease
15-20
Asthma
15-20
Musculoskeletal disorders
20


Hazards website





Work cancers increase with age

More than one in three people in the UK will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime. One in four will die from cancer, almost threequarters of these over the age of 60. More than a quarter of a million people in the UK are diagnosed with cancer every year.

The official Health and Safety Executive (HSE) estimate of the occupational contribution toll is based on a single, discredited, paper. Hazards last year(15) revealed a series of fundamental flaws meant this estimate fell between two and four times short of the real incidence (Hazards 92).

One reason HSE is so far off the mark is the Doll/Peto report on which its estimate is based was limited to an analysis of deaths in those under the age of 65. Cancer is primarily a disease of the old – only 26 per cent of the deaths in England in 2003 were in people under the age of 60, so it is likely the great majority of occupational cancers would have been omitted from the figure.

Occupational cancers by definition only occur in those of working age and above and, because of latency periods before the development of disease, many are likely to emerge in old age. We have an ageing population – as other causes of death decline more are likely to survive long enough to develop their occupational cancers.

Hazards put the work-related cancer toll at between 8 and 16 per cent of all cancers. This would translate to between 12,000 and 24,000 work-related cancer deaths year and between 21,600 and 43,200 new cases, the overwhelming majority in people at least 60 years old.

Hazards website


Robbed of retirement

Colin and Sandra Dyal had just celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary when he died in January 2006. Colin had worked for over 30 years for Goodyear in the West Midlands. As an instrument technician, most of his working life was spent in the asbestos riddled boiler house, providing power to the large tyre plant.

Colin was first told he could have the asbestos cancer mesothelioma in May 2002, and the diagnosis was confirmed in August. He was 56 (Hazards 94). Colin died just after his 60th birthday on 11 January 2006.

“He was a great man,” said Sandra. “He never gave up hope. I’m so glad we treasured the days together. There’s a lot of sorrow at the moment, but I will always have the memories.”

Several thousand adults die of asbestos cancers in the UK every year. In 2004 the official death count from mesothelioma, just one asbestos cancer, was 1,969 cases. Because of the long latency period before the disease appears, most will be approaching or over retirement age when the disease is diagnosed. They are robbed of years of life and quality of life.

Hazards website




Older women, older workers

TUC in 2002 warned that the health and safety of older women was being neglected.(16) It called on employers to ask older women workers about the risks they faced, and for occupational health researchers to become more gender aware. It also called for unions to encourage older workers to become safety reps (Hazards 78).

A 2003 report from TUC on women and the menopause(17) said many women have jobs that could be making menopause related symptoms worse, and called for employers to provide better welfare facilities, rest breaks and more forethought and understanding (Hazards 82).

There is also anecdotal evidence that women suffering from asbestos related cancers face a tougher battle obtaining compensation than men. And women’s work more commonly includes “emotional labour” and the related stresses and pressures of caring roles.

But there is very little hard evidence in the literature, because there has been a dearth of detailed studies. ‘Older women, work and health’,(18) a November 2006 report from Help the Aged and The Age and Employment Network (TAEN), commented: “Women now make up nearly half of all employees in the UK. The female employment rate is about 70 per cent and is increasing in older age groups. There are one and a half million female workers aged 45–64 and 113,000 over the age of 65. Yet little is known about the quality of their working lives. At all stages of their working lives women are more likely than men to work part-time; they are concentrated in certain areas of employment; they are more likely to be in low-status jobs; and they earn less than men.”

The report adds: “All these factors influence the well-being of women workers, especially in the later years of their employment. But the combination of age and gender discrimination means that few studies have explored their circumstances or analysed their occupational health needs.”

It concludes: “Any attempt to promote the health of older women within the labour force will come up against two types of discriminatory practice: those against women and those against older workers.” It calls for “greater age and gender sensitivity in the practices of the Health and Safety Executive and associated bodies,” with “the development of an appropriate knowledge base and more appropriate indicators for monitoring the occupational health of older women.”

Authors Lesley Doyal and Sarah Payne of the School of Policy Studies at the University of Bristol conclude that greater commitment to age and gender equality is needed in occupational health research, the organisation of work, workplace health interventions and in the framing of wider social policy if the needs of older working women are to be met.

The Help the Aged/TAEN report says changes will be needed in the culture of the workplace if older women are not to be damaged by psychosocial aspects of their work. “This will involve giving them greater control over their working lives. It will also require more effective policies to facilitate the combination of working lives and care of dependants.” It says workplace health promotion activities can fail to meet the needs of older workers in general and older women in particular, problems that must be addressed.

The report concludes broader public policy initiatives will also be necessary “if the health needs of older women in employment are to be met, including a focus on equalising pensions and other benefits that will enable older women to make health choices about employment.”

Patrick Grattan, chief executive of TAEN, said the report “highlights a neglected issue. There has been little research on the work and health of older people, and of older women in particular. And yet the need for extended working lives in the face of increasing longevity and ageing populations is not in dispute.

“Employment amongst people in their 50s and 60s is rising, driven recently by a growth in the number of older working women. Today, 69 per cent of women aged 50-59 are in paid work and 12 per cent of women aged 60 and over.

“It’s vital that there should be more focus on the needs and health of older working women, an increasingly important group in the labour market, if the government is to realise its ambition of adding a million older people to the workforce.“

CRUSHED HOPES Mary O'Sullivan's husband died building the new Wembley Stadium. Patrick O'Sullivan, 54, was killed on 15 January 2004. Speaking at the unveiling this year of a bronze ‘Building worker’ statue to commemorate those killed in site tragedies, Mary said: “He was crushed to death that morning. And they crushed us to death as well.”


Using the law

Health and safety HSE is clear that health and safety should not be used as grounds to exclude older workers. However, risk assessments should ensure they take account of the individual’s capabilities. They should not make assumptions about supposed capabilities or frailties.

General safety laws apply and should take into account individual factors that might affect health and safety, some of which could be related to age. The Approved Code of Practice to the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations says an employer must “… adapt work to the individual, as regards to the design of workplaces, the choice of work equipment and the choice of working and production methods with a view in particular to alleviating monotonous work and work at a pre-determined work rate.” Regulation 3 says employers should carry out a “suitable and sufficient assessment of… the risks to the health and safety of his employees to which they are exposed while they are at work.”

The management regulations require that risk assessments identify those groups of workers who may be particularly at risk (www.hse.gov.uk/risk). In some instances, this may mean giving particular attention to the needs of older workers. Other regulations covering chemical safety, manual handling, noise at work, computer use and personal protective equipment all include risk assessment requirements that should take account of the capability and needs of the workers undertaking the task, and should endeavour to wherever possible adapt the work to the individual, for example with regard to the design of the workplace, the equipment and the working methods (Hazards 44).

Disability The Disability Discrimination Act requires employers to carry out reasonable adjustments at work to help people with disabilities to remain in work. Official figures suggest 45 per cent of people over the age of 50 have a disability as defined by the law (a long-term health problem limiting normal activities for a year or more). Adjustments could include retraining, job redesign, offering an alternative job, changing working hours or providing equipment.

Age discrimination The Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006 apply to anyone who has employees or who enters into a contract with a person for them to do work. It is now unlawful to decide not to employ, to dismiss, to refuse to training, to deny promotion, to give adverse terms and conditions to a worker on grounds of age. Employers cannot:

* discriminate directly – treat a worker less favourably because of age, unless objectively justified

* discriminate indirectly – work practices or rules that disadvantage workers because of age, unless this can be objectively justified

* harass a worker - conduct related to age that violates your dignity or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment

* victimise a worker - mistreatment where they have made or intend to make or support a complaint of discrimination on grounds of age

French pensions law protects workers

Reforms to French pension laws mean employers are now required to consult with unions on the reduction of the physical strains of the job. The legal changes, introduced in August 2003, set a three-year deadline for the consultation.

Under the new system, both sides must meet at least every three years and discuss working conditions and human resource management issues, the skills of older workers and work-related strain.

According to a report from the European Working Conditions Observatory (EWCO), some measures to offset the effects of physically arduous working conditions - such as bonuses, reduced annual working hours, and early retirement options - were already in place prior to the reform law.(19)

However, EWCO says this is the first time there has been an explicit requirement for action to remedy physical strain. Measures to address problems could include early retirement or new work organisation and safety measures to reduce risks.




Making work workable

The TUC is calling on the government and employers to adopt measures to stop an ageing workforce being pushed out of jobs on to benefits and early pensions.

TUC’s ‘Ready, willing and able’ report said the problem of an ageing workforce could not be solved just by raising the state pension age. That would simply push more older people onto benefits. Instead, it calls on employers to adopt “age-management strategies” to retain workers over 50, such as retraining and flexible working.

Specific policies TUC says “might help create greater flexibility” include:

* Requiring employers to survey their employees to establish the age profile of their workforce, and then consider with those workers and their representatives what policies would help workers to remain in employment for as long as they would want ideally.

* Extending to all employees the right to request flexible working arrangements. This would challenge the assumption that flexible working is only for women, and enable workers coming up to retirement to “downshift” gradually.

* A right to retraining for older workers, with paid time off work to learn new skills. Judicious subsidies could encourage employers to welcome this.

* DWP advice on retirement planning, offered periodically, starting several years ahead of state pension age.

* Partial retirement - the ability to move to reduced hours, and supplement lower wages with a part-time pension. Finland and Sweden have introduced part-time sick pay for workers suffering from long-term ill health - workers who have been off ill for a long time can return to pay on a part-time basis, and receive partial sick pay as well.

Flexibility of itself is no panacea, and has to be introduced sensitively. A 2004 paper in the Journal of Occupational Health and Safety – Australia and New Zealand noted flexibility can provide scope for graduated exits and post-retirement options for older workers.(20)

On the other hand, it said flexibility can also entail a loss of job/income security that is vital to retirement planning. It can also entail increased work intensity leading to early burnout and premature retirement as well as a need to modify “fitness for work” models/parameters and to recalibrate workloads and hazard exposure limits for older workers given general health changes associated with ageing, especially in context of less regulated and longer working hours.

A 2005 report from The Work Foundation, ‘The ageing workforce’, noted: “Organisations, who are already open to the well-being debates, might want to think about the health status of their employees and what role they can play as workers move into retirement. Good health is heralded as ‘one of the cornerstones of well-being in later life’.”(21)

It points to a 2005 paper from the universities of Edinburgh and Kent, ‘Older workers and options for flexible work’, which says quality of work must be a consideration because “work can have a negative impact on health through stress, depressed wages, and poor-quality jobs in terms of hours or working conditions.”(22)

The Work Foundation report says: “Part of the solution to this will be for organisations to think about how they can fit jobs to older workers through a changed conception of work itself, as well as promoting occupational health and work-life balance.[23] This might include simple changes such as moving manual workers into more administrative posts.”


Conclusions

The improving health and longevity in the UK population means the great majority of workers have no significant health impediments to prevent work up to the age of 65 and for many, where they wish, beyond. And the UK’s ageing workforce means these workers will be essential to business, the economy and wider society.

Older workers, however, are being denied access to work on spurious health and even health and safety grounds. There is no credible reason for these exclusions.

That is not to say that an age “blind” approach is required. Age does impact on capability and health status does change with age. A lifetime of exposure to workplace risks can take its toll too. However, these effects can be minimised and better managed.

Specific measures at a policy and workplace level can help older workers remain healthy and productive longer. If government targets for increased employment of older workers are to be met, it will require new “work ability” approaches from employers, including occupational health and safety programmes and workplace level “age management strategies”. Greater government resources and support for these initiatives are necessary, at least until approaches are have been properly honed and established.

There is a case for introducing an explicit legal duty on employers under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations, requiring assessment of jobs to see that job tasks take proper account of the physical capabilities of workers, with a particular focus on older workers and any possible adaptations, job redesign, changes in work hours or schedules or reassignment that might be beneficial. The UK already has a similar safety regulation tailored to younger workers.(24) France has a law requiring periodic review of measures by employers to address the impact of physical strains at work on the employability of older workers, with an explicit requirement to remedy problems identified.

Law or not, age management strategies should be introduced at a workplace level and must target “ageing” rather than just “older” workers. Planning occupational health interventions and devising job redesign or alternative work in good time, with policies looking at workers in the 45+ age group, will provide greater scope for creating suitable and healthy work transitions. Career structures should allow a shift to more suitable work, where necessary or desirable.

The UK’s long hours culture and the intensification of work, with fewer workers expected to do more, is detrimental to both health and productivity. The cumulative harm caused by overwork is likely to disadvantage older workers. Employers should introduce sensible working hours practices, adhering to the Working Time Regulations, and should eliminate excessive work rates. The health and safety enforcement agencies, led by the Health and Safety Executive, should take action to ensure harmful and excessive working hours and work pace are recognised as genuine and illegal health and safety concerns and are enforcement and prevention priorities.

Strategies must also consider gender issues. The health of women workers, and particularly older women workers, has been neglected in occupational health research, in preventive strategies and in approaches by statutory health and safety agencies. There are many gender-related workplace factors ranging from type of work, to health issues to work-life balance that should be considered when considering the employability of older workers.

A new emphasis on occupational health, integrated into board level strategy decisions, is necessary to ensure long-term health problems caused by work are not treated as “tomorrow’s problem”. The problem is today; it is the price paid by the company, the worker and wider society that comes later. Effective implementation of workplace age management strategies will required training of managers and supervisors and a new mind set, focused on maintaining the positive contribution of older workers.

Failure on the part of employers to make any efforts to accommodate older workers could constitute age or disability discrimination. Workers, unions and other advocates should make sure they use age and disability discrimination laws effectively to ensure employers at least meet their minimum legal duties.

Extension to older workers of the “right to ask” for flexible working arrangements would enable older workers to consider alternative work patterns better suited to their capabilities and responsibilities, including the possibility of “sunsetting”, a gradual reduction in work up to retirement. Workers should not be denied safety or vocational training because of their age.

Older workers are less of a sickness problem to employers than the workforce as a whole. They are more likely to take periods of long-term sick leave, however, so sickness policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

Physical fitness in older workers is strongly related to continued fitness to work. Employers can support older workers remaining fit and healthy by providing time, resources and access to facilities for participation in healthy activities inside and outside the workplace.

Official health and safety agencies must be fully involved in overseeing implementation of ageing workforce policies and practices. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) must be provided additional resources to develop advice, guidance and enforcement approaches tailored to ensuring the continued productive and healthy employment of older workers.

Occupational health is not just about the health of the worker. It is about the right to healthy and productive retirement. Poor working conditions are stealing healthy retirement years from workers. Occupational health research and policy must not be limited to ensuring work remains healthy. Both must ensure full consideration is giving to minimising the impact of occupation-related injury and disability in retirement.

Finally, health and safety and the older worker must be a core issue for trade unions. Unions should develop policy on occupational health and safety and the ageing worker. At workplace level, older workers’ health and safety should be raised at workplace health and safety committees, and should be discussed with members. All terms and conditions negotiations should consider the impact on older workers. Unions should also investigate measures to maintain contact with retired members so the real extent of work-related health problems are recognised and acted upon, and affected retired members are provided the necessary support and compensation.


Safety reps’ checklist

Has your workplace got an age policy? It should have. And it should make sure age is not an issue neglected by either the union or the employer.

Union safety Make sure age policy and issues is not overlooked at safety committee meetings. Ensure safety reps are consulted about all issues relating to the recruitment, training and employment of older workers.

Training Workers should not be denied vocational or safety training because of their age. Training should allow older workers to prepare for work that is appropriate to their skills and capabilities.

Suitable work Career structures should allow older workers to move away from work that is a particular risk for them as they get older to work that uses their skills, experience and capabilities.

Flexible work Flexible working practices may allow older workers to reduce their working hours, or to arrange their working hours around caring commitments or preparation for retirement. Examples would include “sunsetting”, a phased hours reduction in the years leading to retirement.

Sickness absence Policies should allow time off to manage chronic health problems.

Health and safety Risk assessments will always take into account particular susceptibility to injury or illness of individuals. Older workers who may have particular needs and susceptibilities must be consulted directly.

Payment schemes Where pay is based on meeting production targets, these should not lead to disadvantage because of age-related factors.

Work rates Are work rates and hours excessive and bad for health? Unions should ensure agreed work patterns are not harmful and do not lead to difficulties or disadvantage for older workers.

Health promotion Opportunities should be provided to help employees to maintain their ability to work, through exercise or addressing physical health problems.

Pension schemes Company pension schemes should not result in pressure to work longer hours in the years preceding retirement.

Gender issues Have health and safety issues affecting older women been given specific attention? A gender neutral approach can neglect differences in the types of jobs and pressures faced sometime by women and men at work.

Consultation All age-sensitive policies and issues should be negotiated with the involvement of older workers and union reps.

Worker involvement Unions should ensure older workers are properly involved and consulted on union and workplace matters.

Retired members Safety reps should endeavour to ensure information on work-related ill-health suffered by retired members is collated, so the true extent of the problems caused by work is ascertained. Retired members should be provided advice and assistance about possible compensation claims for work-related ill-health.




References

1. Facts and misconceptions about age, health status and employability. Report Number HSL/2005/20. [pdf]

2. Ready, willing and able, TUC, August 2006.

3. Health, work and well-being – Caring for our future. ISBN: 1-84388-608-4. HM Government, October 2005. DWP news release and full report [pdf]. DWP news release 19 October 2005.

4. First findings of the European Working Conditions Survey: Working conditions in Europe – what workers say. European Foundation news release, 7 November 2006. Fourth European Working Conditions Survey (2005). European Foundation survey 2000, question on “sustainability of work.”

5. Attitude not age, Employers’ Forum on Age, September 2005. EFA publications webpage.

6. Is work good for your health and well-being?, DWP, September 2006. DWP news release. Health, work and well-being webpages and executive summary of the report and [pdf]. Full report [pdf]

7. Juhani Ilmarinen. Ageing workers, Occupational and Environmental Medicine, volume 58, page 546, 2001.

8. Juhani Ilmarinen. The ageing workforce - challenges for occupational health, Occupational Medicine, volume 56, pages 362-364, 2006.

9. Employment initiatives for an ageing workforce in the EU15, European Foundation, 2006 [pdf]

10. Position paper on age and employment, Faculty of Occupational Medicine of the Royal College of Physicians, August 2004. [pdf]

11. HSE age and gender accident statistics, 2003/04 and 2004/05 (provisional)
Table 11a: Injuries to men employees by age of injured person and severity of injury, 2003/04 - 2004/05p.
Table 11b: Injuries to women employees by age of injured person and severity of injury, 2003/04 - 2004/05p.

12. Trends and context to rates of workplace injury, HSE Research Report RR386, 2005 and [pdf]

13. Occupational ill health age statistics: Information sheet, HSE.

14. A job to die for?, Hazards, number 92, October-December 2005.

15. Burying the evidence, Hazards 92, October-December 2005.

16. Health and work in older women: a neglected issue, TUC/Pennell Institute, 2002. TUC news release

17. Working through the change: health and safety and the menopause, TUC, 2003 [pdf]

18. Older women, work and health, Help the Aged and The Age and Employment Network (TAEN), November 2006. News release. [pdf]

19. Managing physical strain at work, EWCO news pages, 13 August 2004.
Gilles M, Guérin F and Rousseau T, Réduire la pénibilité au travail (Reduce physical strain at work) in Travail et changement (Work and change), ANACT, No. 294, Feb/Mar 2004. [in French].

20. Callaghan K, Francis M and Gorman D. Editorial: Age and employment, Journal of Occupational Health and Safety – Australia and New Zealand, vol.20, pages 291-295, 2004.

21. Natalie Turner and Laura Williams. The ageing workforce, The Work Foundation, 2005. [pdf]

22. Loretto W, Vickerstaff S and White P, Older workers and Options for Flexible Work, Working Paper Series No 31, Universities of Edinburgh and Kent, 2005

23. Hirsch B, Macpherson D and Hardy M, Occupational age structure and access for older workers, Industrial and Labour Relations Review, Vol 53 No 3, pp401–418, 2000.

24. Too young to die, Hazards, Number 95, July-September 2006.

Other sources

European Foundation ageing workforce case studies

Age and working conditions in the European Union, European Foundation, 2003.

Foundation Focus - Issue 2: Age and employment, European Foundation, September 2006.

Employment in Europe, European Commission, October 2003.
Summary document [pdf] or and full report [pdf].

ACAS Age in the workplace advice leaflet. ACAS helpline on 08457 47 47 47.

Occupational health and safety issues and for the older worker, New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services, USA, December 2003 [pdf]

Why should a workplace look at issues concerning ageing workers?, CCOHS factsheet, Canada, 2002.

Older workers: living longer, working longer, DELSA newsletter issue 2, OECD, 2006. [pdf]


Relevant websites

Hazards age webpages

Hazards work and health webpages

TUC workSMART ten point age regulation myth-buster

HSE age and gender statistics

FIOH ‘Ageing and work’ webpages

European Foundation ‘age’ webpages

European Foundation ‘Ageing and work’ webpages.

TAEN – The Age and Employment Network, 207-221 Pentonville Road, London N1 9UZ. Tel: 020 7843 1590.

Agebusters website

DWP’s Age Positive project

Employers Forum on Age (EFA)



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