So what is the right age?

This week there’s been much discussion of Miriam O’Reilly’s successful age discrimination case against the BBC. I find these sorts of cases really interesting. Not only is there the question of whether age discrimination is more common for women, but there’s also the question of what age is the ‘right’ age?

Ultimately, I suppose it depends on the field you are working in as to whether people want older or younger people. But there is a danger that the ‘right’ age becomes so narrow that there are only a few years left.

I remember in the first year as a councillor, going to a meeting with my 2 ward colleagues (who are both younger than me, and also female). The secretary of the person we were going to see came down to fetch ‘councillors Bush, Bell and Thomas’. We watched her look around for some time before she worked out that 3 young-looking women sat together were actually the councillors. I don’t blame her for this. We do break the stereotypes for councillors.

But it is not uncommon for some people to not be able to look past somebody’s age, and to take them less seriously if they are young. And it is not only older people that do that. When I began teaching at university, it was not uncommon for new teachers to try and look older than they were- the blokes to grow a beard, or the women to wear high heels and dress more smartly than they normally would. They wanted the students to take them seriously.

I am now 36, and I still often get referred to as young (not always disparagingly). I note that Miriam O’Reilly is 53. So I’m guessing the ‘right’ age is when you’re in your 40s? This is clearly wrong, and I am glad we have a legal process to stop injustices happening. But this needs to be a last resort. Its use demonstrates that something has gone wrong.

What we really need is culture change, not legal cases. This means all of us challenging each other and ourselves when we think differently about someone based on their age (or gender, race, sexual orientation etc) and not on their abilities and so on.

Of course, part of the problem here is that politics is one of the worst arenas and needs a culture change itself. The percentage of women in top positions in political parties is woefully low. This has to be partly a culture problem, as I am sure there are plenty of women who want to, and are capable of, fulfilling those roles.

Samira Ahmed commented that the discussion programmes she had seen discussing this topic were both chaired by older men (as has been all the coverage I’ve seen). So I guess there’s still a long way to go on the culture thing.