Category Archives: Human rights

Towards a UN Convention on the Rights of Older Persons: 11th session of the Open-Ended Working Group on Ageing 29.03-01.04.2021 

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Caroline Green is Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Policy Research Unit in Health and Social Care Workforce, King’s College London. In December 2020, Caroline released a Human Rights toolkit as a means of reflecting on human rights in the context of social care. (218 words)

The COVID-19 pandemic has unleashed unprecedented concern over the treatment and rights of older people in societies globally. It has highlighted levels of structural and institutionalised ageism in addition to numerous issues that are in violation of the human rights and freedoms of individuals who are older. Calls have thus grown louder to adopt a UN Convention on the Rights of Older Persons. Its purpose could be to provide a legal human rights framework tailored to specific issues concerning older age groups as a powerful tool for change.

United Nations headquarters in New York, seen from the East River.

To discuss the possibility of such a Convention, delegates from around the world will meet between the 29.03 and the 01.04.2021 at the UN Headquarters in New York for the 11th session of the UN Open-Ended Working Group on Ageing. It will include a virtual element and will be accessible to follow on UN TV and open to all – no registration needed. The address to access this will be: webtv.un.org. More details about the hearing are available at: bit.ly/OEWG11_OlderPersonsRights. Additional info about this process is available via the UN website – specifically on the Open-Ended Working Group on Ageing part of the site. This is available via: https://social.un.org/ageing-working-group/ – then follow Eleventh Session tab for more info/documents relevant to the hearing.

Caroline Green is Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Policy Research Unit in Health and Social Care Workforce, King’s College London. In December 2020, Caroline released a Human Rights toolkit as a means of reflecting on human rights in the context of social care.

Toolkit for reflection on human rights in the context of social care

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Caroline Green is Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Policy Research Unit in Health and Social Care Workforce, King’s College London. (709 words)

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of human rights for people needing care and support in care homes or at home, their carers, families and friends became evident. Care home residents, especially people with dementia, were one of the groups who were and still are most severely affected by the virus, with thousands of deaths from a COVID-19 infection not only in England but many countries around the world. The need to protect people requiring care and support and to balance infection control – thus the basic rights to health and life – with the right to a private and family life and to social participation was but one of many examples of a human rights issue that we as a society had to face during this pandemic. Conversations around these topics are often difficult.

Human rights as enshrined in international and national law, notably the Human Rights Act, are directly relevant to people requiring care and support, service providers and care workers. Not only is every human being entitled to have his or her rights respected, protected and implemented but the English legal and regulatory system for care providers also makes them directly relevant in care settings. However, human rights are more than a legal concept. They are also a moral concept, which can help to build a social care system and determine the way care is provided. Human rights in social care is therefore a broad topic, with many different ways of approaching it in conversations, training and research. Continue reading →