Full text of the intervention of the Secretary for Social Affairs, Domingos Cunha, in the celebrations, today in Ribeira Grande, of the International Day of the Elderly:

“The social policy promoted by the Government of the Azores addressed at the elderly population, answers to the challenges imposed by the aging of the population, by the increase of the average hope of life and other social transformations, namely, those that stem from the entry of the woman in the labour market.

The Government of the Azores takes as a referential system the development of appropriate policies to the diversity of the social situations of the elderly, which mobilize the appropriate resources and which allow to efficiently fight against the risks of social exclusion in a more advanced life phase.

In this way, the Regional Government places in the centre of the policy of support to the elderly population the reinforcement of the policies meant for limiting the increase of the dependence and the health cares, promoting a healthy aging, preventing the accidents and rehabilitating after the disease and, for other side, improving the quality and quantity of the answers of welcome of elderly in function of the degree of dependence.

The Regional Government has been privileging, along the last years, flexible kinds of intervention, through the establishment of a network of services and social equipments, which acting in proximity and with the support of IPSS, Misericórdias, some Autarchies and NGO's, contribute to the maintenance of the people in their usual life environment, even of those that are in situation of dependence.

It is in this way that the social answers in the area of the third age held a very positive growth in all the services, in the last years. There is registered, therefore, an increase of equipments and services, where there stand out the services of domiciliary help, day centres, conviviality centres, retirement homes, along with others.

For the success of these policies of the Government of the Azores, the amounts for the investment and functioning with the social equipments had a global increase of 46%, being that, in the year of 2007, they exceeded 50 million euros.

I want to point out that in the area of the third age, in the last four years, the amounts spent suffered an increase of 21%.

Therefore, the Government of the Azores wants to give continuity to the social policies in a coherent and supported way, namely through the enlargement and consolidation of the regional networks, following the policy of investment in quality equipments appropriate to the types of pretended answers, as well as to promote and control the quality of the given cares and services.

Face to the aging of the population and to the increase of the average hope of life, the Government of the Azores is going to give continuity to a policy of social action that aims at the enlargement of a network of services and social equipments by means of the identification of the needs identified in each community, as it will continue, also, to stimulate the social partners and private people for the investment in this specific area, for which there were created the already published incentives.

The Regional Government wants to keep on promoting an active aging and with dignity, because it understands that it is in this way that it contributes so that our elderly keep on being citizens of full right, constituting an asset and a source of great wealth for the community and on behalf of the continuous development of the Azores”.