“Never grow old.” That’s what my father advised me. Unfortunately, I’ve not taken his advice and I find myself, as he did, in my mid-70s. And I’m not alone. About a fifth of the Scottish population is over the age of 65. That figure is only going to grow over the next 20 years. There are already 40,000 Scots over the age of 90 and that’s expected to double by 2043.
So The Scottish Government’s plan for a National Care Service looked like a good idea, until it was discovered it would cost a lot of money. On Thursday, the care minister, Maree Todd, announced to parliament that she had been forced to abandon the plan in the face of opposition from local councils, the care service providers and the trade unions. Only thin remnants of the plan remain, in the form of an advisory body on standards. It’s a stinging embarrassment for the SNP, since a National Care Service was one of their flagship policies at the last election.
The original plan was to take all care services out of the hands of local councils and run them, like the health service, on a national level. But there was never any funding mechanism to make it work. So the problem of an aging population, requiring more nursing homes and care in their own homes, has been left unsolved. So too has the issue of “bed blocking” which now sees 2,000 elderly patients stuck in hospital because there is no care plan which could transfer them to a nursing home or back into their own homes with support.
None of the political parties has a solution, nor the courage to suggest one. My own favourite is a retirement levy, by which everyone as they retire from work, would pay a lump sum into a National Care Service and thus be guaranteed free social care if they require it later in life. The sum would have to be quite substantial, say 10 per cent of a person’s wealth, and perhaps that’s why politicians are reluctant to suggest it.
Other people who have not followed by father’s advice include a worrying number of world leaders: Putin (72), Xi Jinping (71), Jo Biden (82), and of course Donald Trump (78). Their age persuades them to hark back dangerously to by-gone times and empires, as in “Make America Great Again,” Trump’s return to the 1950s.
His inauguration as the 47th president began shambolically – Trump was off mike taking the oath, the band failed to play on time, Melania’s hat, pressed down over her eyes, had such a broad brim, old Donald could not get near enough to kiss her. Then the farce took a sinister turn as he took America back in time and into a world of isolation and exceptionalism.
The big speech was full of vitriol, false claims, irresponsible promises, illegal actions and a few plainly impossible policies. There was the manned mission to Mars. Then the deportation of 11 million migrants. Then taking back the Panama Canal. Soon we were being urged to “drill, baby drill” and withdraw from the UN Climate Agreement. He then pardoned the vandals who had invaded the very building now hosting this hallowed ceremony. And he was doing all this because God had spared him to “Make America Great Again.”
“Then let us pray that come it may/ As come it will for a’ that/That sense and worth o’re a’ the earth/Shall bear the gree for a’ that.”
Wood carving by the banks of the Spey near Aviemore.
How is Scotland to deal with this errant grandson? John Swinney, First Minister, said: “There is absolutely no alternative but for me to engage with the US administration led by Donald Trump.” But he went on to say that Scotland had to be “equipped and ready” for tariffs against Scottish exports to America, in particular Scotch Whisky, worth £1 billion a year.
There’s already a ban on the import of traditional Scottish haggis, because it contains lamb’s lungs. Maybe that could be lifted as part of the negotiations. In any case, one leading supplier Macsween’s is hoping to get round the ban by substituting lamb’s heart for lamb’s lung in the ingredients.
As I write, we are having a stormy lead-up to Burns Night on Saturday. Winds are forecast to reach 90mph in places. The rail network has been closed down, schools and public buildings closed. So I wonder what Robert Burns (37) would have made of this week’s events?
Would he have said, as he did in Tam O’ Shanter: “The storm without might rare and rustle/ but Tam didn’e mind the storm a whistle?”
Would he have said of Trump’s exceptionalism:
“O, wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as others see us!
It wad frae monie a blunder free us,
An’ foolish notion.”
