The campaign celebrates older Australians and is a call for action by the community to address age discrimination.
In launching the project, both speakers reflected on how hard it is for people over 50 to find employment, even though they bring to a workplace experience and competence. “We are living through a massive demographic change,” said Commissioner Ryan, “yet community attitudes, employment practises and business strategies seem to ignore where we are now. The Power of Oldness campaign will, we hope, prod everyone to recognise and act to stop age discrimination.”
Senator Abetz said that the campaign is a way of getting the message about the value of older workers, to people of all ages around Australia.
There was a good crowd of people, both young and old, at the launch which was held at the Human Rights Commission in Sydney. It was very clear that those present were convinced that, if employment discrimination against older people was ended, there would be good social and economic results and also a development of deeper community for us all.
Many people shared stories of highly skilled and experienced people who lost their jobs and then found it really hard to even achieve an interview when applying for a new position – sometimes being told by those concerned that they were not interested in anybody who was older than 35 years.
