Established in 1948, Glasgow’s Golden Generation (GGG) is Glasgow’s leading charity for the elderly. We currently support 2,000 service users across the city, c. 800 of whom will be living with some form of dementia. Our vision is that no senior citizen will be forgotten or neglected when they reach old age, and that they will receive the support they need to live life as fully and as independently as possible. Many of our service users live alone and have little or no support network.
GGG has two Day Centres in Glasgow and provides a Befriending Service, Social Clubs. Digital Inclusion Project and a Welfare Advice and Careline Service to respond to the needs of older adults to address social isolation and poverty and enable all older people (and their carers) to have a better quality of life.
Welfare Advice and Careline
GGG is currently seeking funding for our Welfare and Advice and Careline Service which supported 470 older people and secured £1,023,000 in benefits entitlement last year. Our aim is to ensure that all older people are fully aware of their benefit entitlement, from attendance allowance, which is non-means tested, to carers allowance, pension credit, housing benefit and council tax benefit. Clients can spend attendance allowance on whatever they feel will enhance their quality of life. This may mean getting a podiatrist to the house, getting a hairdresser to wash their hair, to buy warmer bedding or to turn the heating up without worrying. It gives the older person a sense of independence as they are still in control of their day-to-day activities. It also alleviates the stress on families and the main carers.
Home visits are the most effective way of supporting clients, where living conditions and personal care conditions can be assessed; some clients do not recognise neglect, whether it be in their domestic setting or personal well-being. The team is also able to refer to Occupational Therapy for assessment to be carried out for aids and adaptions. This enables the client to stay at home safely, with aids to help them with daily tasks and the aim of avoiding hospital admission. Throughout the pandemic we pivoted our service to telephone applications. The team were able to complete some benefit applications online on clients’ behalf, but attendance allowance is still a paper application; 40 pages of questions, and clients tell you what they can do, not what they can no longer do, so it takes patience and understanding of each individual’s situation to talk the client through the application. The tact and understanding of our welfare team has resulted in a 95% success rate and their reputation is acknowledged by DWP accreditation.
In October Senior Welfare Officer Lynn received a card from a lady she had helped saying “Thank you so much for the support I will now be able to out the heating on without worrying.”
By helping fund our Welfare Team to visit people at their home you can help us help older people live life to the fullest!