Older People's Strategy - Newcastle City Council

26Outcome 1aOlder people are engaged in decision-making‘I want to be active – contributing to community issues for thegeneral well-being of all’ (The Way Ahead)Issues and prioritiesMany older people are willing to give their time to engage indecision-making, providing that the principles and mechanismsused are appropriate and make best use of their time. TheJoseph Rowntree Foundation has developed a set of principlesfor the effective engagement of older people (see Annex 7,Note 7). Engagement needs to be adequately resourced andsupported if people are to use their time effectively and beproperly informed of the outcome of their efforts.Where we are nowIn Newcastle, for over 15 years, there have been some goodmodels of engagement of older people in decision-making.Examples include the work of Action for Health – SeniorCitizens in Newcastle and ‘a better life in later life’ (Newcastle’sBetter Government for Older People Programme).Newcastle City Council is a Civic Pioneer (see Annex 7, Note 8)authority and has recently published a Community EngagementStrategy together with a toolkit on how to engage and consultwith people effectively. The City Council is also developingstronger processes for including citizens in decision-makingat ward level (see www.newcastle.gov.uk/core.nsf/a/wardcoordination).