Tag: Elder abuse

By Heng Yi Xin

The state’s duty to intervene when situations go awry for children has been imprinted in the nation’s consciousness as early as 1890. However, the same recognition has not been extended to a group who experience abuse at a comparable rate– the elderly.  This is worrying as New Zealand is expected to witness a 77% increase in the number of New Zealanders above age 65 between now and 2036 .

Apart from experiencing a brief spike in news coverage in June (when World Elder Awareness Day is commemorated), there is hardly any momentum to demand for an urgent response. Elder abuse is only mentioned four times in the Ministry of Health’s Healthy Ageing Strategy and an arguably toothless directive to “update the 2007 Family Violence Intervention Guidelines on elder abuse and neglect” was given to address the issue.

A policy response to elder abuse has not been directly articulated by the Labour Party, although a Joint Inquiry into Aged Care was made in collaboration with the Green Party and Grey Power (an advocacy group for citizens aged 50 and above) in 2017. The National Party is still tentatively crafting their aging policy and has encouragingly listed “elder abuse and neglect” as an issue of concern in their online survey. This issue has not made its way into New Zealand First’s coalition priorities either.

Recommendations made by the Joint Inquiry into Aged Care are worthy of consideration. There were calls for the establishment of an Aged Care Commissioner who will investigate allegations of elder abuse and complaints made against nursing homes. Currently, this portfolio is subsumed under the role of the Health and Disability Commissioner, who is undertaking the juggling act of advocating for better disability, mental health and addiction services. Equally pertinent was the proposal to standardise the quality of aged care; elderly abuse and neglect prevention services are currently contracted to a range of organisations across the country, such as Age Concern.

The extent to which this issue is covered by existing laws is arguably limited. Elder abuse is protected by a hodgepodge legislation, such as the Protection of Personal Property Rights Act 1988 (deals with enduring powers of attorney), Crimes Act 1961 (the carer has a legal duty to protect vulnerable adults from injury) and the Privacy Act 1993 (banks have a duty of confidentiality to customers, but can do little beyond asking the customer “Are you okay?”).

The unique nature of elder abuse demands a separate piece of legislation. As noted by the Ministry of Health in the 2007 Family Violence Intervention Guidelines and assessments of cognitive capacity may need to be conducted. Additional resources are needed to ensure that the older person’s voice is heard in the decision making process; having diminished capacity does not justify exclusion.

There might be hesitation to implement an elder abuse law due to varying definitions of being “elderly”. As Moir, Blundell, Clare and Clare (2017) argue, victims in their 40s, 50s and 60s risk being overlooked if an arbitrary line is drawn at age 65. This can be easily reconciled by defining the target population as “adults at risk” with old age as but one risk factor for abuse.

Adult protection legislation is already an established practice in the UK. The Care Act 2014 gave local authorities in the UK the power to safeguard adults whose wellbeing has been compromised by abuse and neglect. The Welsh Government has followed suit with the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014, while Scotland has had the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act as early as 2007. The Australian Law Reform Commission’s 2016 Discussion Paper on Elder Abuse also recommended the introduction of an adult safeguarding law and a screening process to ascertain the suitability of all employees working in the aged care sector – much like the safety check introduced by the Children’s Act in 2014 for the child protection workforce in New Zealand.

Social workers in New Zealand should critically evaluate recommendations made by the Joint Inquiry into Aged Care and take a step further to consider the desirability of an adult protection law and adult protection services. Elder abuse should no longer be left in the grey.

Photo credit Retrieved from Flickr, by The Other Dan, 2006, Retrieved 2019, June. 4, from https://www.flickr.com/photos/58919362@N00/332174596. Copyright 2006 by CC BY-NC 2.0.

References

Australian Law Reform Commission. (2017). Elder abuse: A national legal response. Retrieved from https://www.alrc.gov.au/sites/default/files/pdfs/publications/elder_abuse_131_final_report_31_may_2017.pdf.

Macandrew, R. (2018, June 15). Financial abuse of elderly ‘rampant’ in New Zealand with drug-use part of the problem. Stuff. Retrieved from  https://www.stuff.co.nz/.

Ministry of Health. (2007). Family violence intervention guidelines: Elder abuse and neglect. Retrieved from https://www.health.govt.nz/system/files/documents/publications/family-violence-guideliens-elder-abuse-neglect.pdf.

Ministry of Health. (2016). Healthy ageing strategy. Retrieved from https://www.health.govt.nz/system/files/documents/publications/healthy-ageing-strategy_june_2017.pdf.

Moir, E., Blundell, B., Clare, J., & Clare, M. (2017). Best practice for estimating elder abuse prevalence in Australia: Moving towards the dynamic concept of ‘adults at risk’ and away from arbitrary age cut-offs. Current Issues in Criminal Justice, 29(2), 181-190. doi: 10.1080/10345329.2017.12036095.

New Zealand Labour Party, Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand and Grey Power. (2017). Inquiry into aged care. Retrieved from https://www.greens.org.nz/sites/default/files/policy-pdfs/Aged%20Care%20Report%20Sep17.pdf.

SuperSeniors. (n.d.). Our ageing population. Retrieved from http://www.superseniors.msd.govt.nz/about-superseniors/media/key-statistics.html.