Age UK supplies PM with a petition supporting its calls for NHS entities, local councils and others to be required to provide phone, face to face, or assisted digital options

The UK’s biggest charity dedicated to older people has implored ministers to implement an “enforceable” commitment that all public services should offer users an offline option.

Age UK last week delivered a petition to 10 Downing Street – signed by 173,949 people – calling on government to put in place a “clear guarantee” that mandated all public services, including NHS and local government provision, to offer an option accessible to those lacking digital skills or access. This could encompass in-person support, or an assisted-digital offering to guide users through online processes.

The petition was presented as the charity also published findings of its own analysis, which concluded that 2.4 million older people – equating to one in five of the UK’s overall total – currently use the internet no more than once a month. And, in many cases, not at all.

Age UK’s study found that such limited internet access was especially prevalent among some defined groups of the elderly, including older Black people, of whom 32% very rarely go online, and Asian people, where the figure is 26%. Some 30% of those who live alone access the web once a month at most, while the proportion stands at 22% – three points higher than the overall average – for women and those with financial difficulties.

The charity’s data also showed that almost a million elderly citizens go online less than they did a year ago, “reinforcing the fact found in previous Age UK research that older people who go online do not always stay there as they age, for a wide range of reasons”, the charity said.

Other details from Age UK’s research included the finding that a third of older people do not use a smartphone, while a similar proportion feel that insufficient tech skills get in the way of them using the internet.

In light of such data, the charity said it was “concerned that a ‘digital first’ approach – with insufficient offline alternatives available and a lack of opportunities to support those who want to go online to do so – will see older people struggling to manage their own finances and healthcare as they age”.

Related content

• Minister slams ‘scandal’ of failure to update digital inclusion strategy since 2014
• IBM UK boss and digital inclusion charity chief join DSIT board
• ‘No excuse for inaction’ – is government doing enough to tackle digital exclusion?

The government is being urged by the charity to both accelerate digital inclusion initiatives, as well as provide a formal enshrinement of citizens’ right to access non-digital provision of key services.

“Through our petition, older people who aren’t able or choose not to be online told us they were deeply worried about being locked out of the essential services they depend on,” said Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK. “Some said that they felt belittled and unfairly bullied into going online and that this, plus a frequent failure on the part of organisations of all kinds to offer them easily accessible alternatives, was positively ageist. Whether you agree with that or not, there’s no doubt in our minds at Age UK that a poorly planned and delivered transition to digital by default would pose very real risks to the health, wellbeing, finances and inclusion of millions of older people: for their sake above all we have to get it right.”

She added: “The government’s commitment to a digitally inclusive approach is really important for this reason, to build public trust. It is also essential if the NHS’s promise of being equally accessible to all to is to continue to hold true in our increasingly digital world. Over time, it’s true that more people are going online and feeling comfortable using tech in later life, but some people will always be offline or only very basic users, for all kinds of different reasons. However inconvenient this reality may be, we have to factor it into how we design services; in some cases, for example, it may be possible to develop tech-based approaches that do not depend on an individual older person having to manipulate them themselves. Nonetheless, for the foreseeable future there will be a need for good offline alternatives and the government must ensure they are put in place in every essential service on which older people rely.”