LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Age Concern and the Debate of the Age
From Lady Green gross, OBE, Director General of Age Concern England Sir, Your issue of 4th June 1999 fundamentally misrepresents the views and position of Age Concern England and the Debate of the Age in three separate editorial pieces. At your invitation, we shall be setting out key issues in the next edition of The Catholic Herald. In the meantime I want to apprise your readers of the facts.
Age Concern has never campaigned for the legalisation of euthanasia. This is not a subject on which the charity would ever take a view.
Age Concern instituted the Debate of the Age so that individuals and professionals could express their views on the key challenges facing us in the new millennium.
The debate is a huge consultation programme dealing with a raft of issues and involving a range of public and professionals with a wide spectrum of opinions. All the views will be recorded in a final report.
The outcomes of the Debate — which have not been predetermined — will not necessarily coincide with the views or policies of Age Concern.
Members of the Debate's "Values and Attitudes" expert study group represent a range of opinion and were selected for this reason.
The discussion on end-oflife issues formed a part of of the agenda for one event where many other health and care issues were discussed. This event was one of many in the Values and Attitudes programme, itself only one of five key areas of discussion for the debate. The suggestion that the Debate revolves around the issue of euthanasia is, therefore, wildly inaccurate.
We take great exception to the implication that Age Concern uses its charitable funds unwisely or inappropriately. All our work aims to improve the situation for older people both now and in the future.
The Age Concern movement is the largest voluntary deliverer of services to older people in the UK. Age Concern England's own information service answers 45,000 enquiries from older people and their families a year. The suggestion that we do not provide direct practical help to older people damages our reputation and could ultimately damage our ability to provide this vital help to those who need it.
Yours faithfully SALLY GREENGROSS London SW1 From Professor Robert Leaper Sir, "Age Concern promotes euthanasia campaign" proclaims your headline on June 4, followed by a major article and an editorial on Age Concern. I have recently retired from being an elected trustee on Age Concern England, and from the chairmanship of its training committee. At no time was the governing body asked to accept a policy of support for euthanasia. If it had been, I should certainly have opposed it, and if it were adopted I should have had to resign.
I have been through some pretty heated debates in Age Concern England, where people from quite different backgrounds and standpoints have managed to find common ground on policies and provisions. This is the common experience of most of us involved in the work of public authorities in a pluralist society — and the same applies to voluntary or commercial bodies in health, social services, housing and entertainment. On some matters of principle no compromise is possible and protests like that mounted by Rita Saville are fully justified.
Exeter Age Concern is One of over a thousand local autonomous bodies responsive to local needs and providing a range of services. As its former chairman I rather resent your portrayal of our efforts as being "more political in its aims" than Help the Aged which you say is "giving practical help".
I have been very critical of the "Debate of the Age", a short-term campaign initiated by the Director-General of Age Concern, but run with support and involvement from bodies and individuals outside Age Concern.
The campaign has at any rate stimulated a lot of new interest in the urgent problems — and opportunities — resulting from rapid demographic change.
The Millennium Papers are a mixed bag. It seems to me a blunder to have chosen as chairman of the "Values and Attitudes Group" a person with pronounced and wellpublicised views on a controversial ethical question. We now all have the chance to martial our arguments against euthanasia and to put them clearly to those who wellmeaningly — but wrongly, I believe — espouse them.
Yours faithfully, ROBERT LEAPER Exeter, EX4