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34
opened in October 1962 by the Mayor, and the activities for the elderly
carried on there are as follows :
(i) An afternoon club for the elderly
This is held at present on a Thursday afternoon and additional
sessions will be started if attendances warrant them.
(ii) The rest room
One of the classrooms has been brightly and comfortably furnished
as a rest room where any elderly person in the locality can sit down,
buy snacks, read journals or play cards, if he so desires. This has not
so far caught on very well for casual visitors, but the room has been used
by members of the club and those attending the workshop.
(iii) Workshop for the elderly
There has been a tendency up and down the country to establish
what are called workshops for the elderly, in which light unskilled or
semi-skilled work is carried out for what amounts to a nominal wage.
The objective is to let an elderly person, particularly a lonely elderly
person, realise that he or she can still be of use to the community.
There has been no lack of persons wishing to do the work, a greater
problem being the amount of suitable work available. The workroom
at Burnt Ash started in one classroom with a mere handful of people in
the autumn, but by the end of the year it had so increased that the
second classroom was necessary and this increase (after a difficult period
during the cold spring) shows signs of continuing.
Altogether, apart from certain inherent and basic difficulties, this
part of the Council's work appears to be met with increasing success.
The workpeople are given pocket money at the rate of Is. 6d. an hour
and sessions are held morning and afternoon for two hours each, five
days a week. The workers attend for a varying number of sessions a
week according to their capacity and the amount of work available,
a guiding objective being to spread the work over as large a number
of workers as is reasonably practicable.
(c) Site of the Naborhood Cinema
The general policy of the Council would appear to be moving in
the direction of establishing various comprehensive or semicomprehensive
centres for the elderly in different parts of the borough. The
Saville is near the geographical centre of the borough. Burnt Ash is in
the southeast segment, and in the southwest segment in Sydenham
Road there is a site of an old cinema which belongs to the Borough
Council, and it has now been decided that in addition to establishing
shops or business premises on the ground floor (to fit in with the general
development in the neighbourhood) a centre for old people will be
built, partly on the ground floor but mainly on the first floor, to which
there will be a lift. Plans are fairly far advanced and it is hoped that
more specific development will occur during the current year.
(d) Holidays and holiday home
There has been an increasing tendency, certainly amongst metropolitan
boroughs, to accept that there is a considerable physical and
psychological advantage to many old people in getting away to the
country or preferably the seaside for a short holiday. LOPWA has
each year for the last few years increased the number of facilities for