Joan Bakewell...........

I'm not grumbling about my situation - but I am privileged compared to many, and good for Jaon for sticking up for the less well-off.

I will be up the creek financially if OH were to pass away - this is one of the reasons why I have been arguing for fair treatment when the new flatrate pension arrives.

We have had lots of chances indeed and I am grateful for these, but there is a lot of poverty amongst the elderly.

This won't get many comments.

They are too busy deciding what to put in their shopping trolleys. [yawn]

Every generation gets chances, some of us took them! Today there is more of a feeling that 'someone should do something about it' rather than do it yourself.

DH was born of poor parents who did their best for him and he went to grammar school as a result which meant that none of the people who lived near him went to the same school. We have moved around a lot in order to progress so have lost out on the help from relatives which we might have had if we had stayed in one place. These were the chances we took, others didn't but such things are still available if people want to look for them.

think Ms Bakewell being as well heeled as she is would know very little about the pooer elderly now - not a good person to speak against the 'never had it so good' jibe and get the message across.

My husband came from a very large poor family with no father (he died young). Husband got into grammar school and did fairly well.

But there are very few grammar schools these days so that's one thing that we had that children today do not.

I'm sure I remember there being many more jobs available in the late fifties and sixties than there are now. And there was job security.

Wasn't she once called the thinking mans crumpet?

Yes Smol and she had an affair with Harold Pinter!

Hasn't she actually been sort of named as one of those Tsar type posts, rather than being self appointed?

(May be wrong, often am!)

I seem to remember that Phoenix. (just looked it up - 2008-10)

it does not follow that because somebody is well off they do not understand the constraints of poverty. Firstly because current prosperity does not mean they were not born or brought up in poverty. Secondly many professions like medicine, some lawyers and police do very much come face to face with poverty in their work, others work with people in distressed circumstances on a voluntary basis and understand the constraints and limited choices faced by those on small incomes.

she is a Labour peer, ex-media and not one who would have first hand knowledge of poverty in the her work place.

Mollie JB was brought up in the back streets of Stockport like me and although I think it's a matter of regret that she substituted her Stockport accent with a posh one, I think it's reasonable to suppose that she has both the intelligence and the experience to empathise with people less fortunate than herself.

according to information on her background she grew up in a 1930s (must have been new when she lived there) semi detached house south of Stockport and went to Cambridge University. Her parents were not poor working class backstreet dwellers. But I would suggest that no amount of so-called 'poverty' in youth would necessarily mean she has any idea of elderly poverty now.

Does it matter where Joan Bakewell grew up, what her background is, or whether she talks posh or mancunian?!

She speaks up for elderly people. That's enough for me.

And she comes across as a decent sort.

Tbhey couldn't have forced that tsar type post on her phoenix.

Jane, Hazel Grove isn't quite the back streets of Stockport. At one time, children were discouraged from speaking with a local accent and this might well have been the case with JB. I can't understand why some members here are a bit grudging about her. She has fought her way to prominence in the male-dominated world of the media. It would be very interesting to have a web chat with her and let her speak for herself. Are you listening, HQ?

We've had one!

here it is