Flying under the radar : LGBT older persons, active ageing and dementia care policies in Malta

Abstract

Malta’s vanguard progress in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights needs no introduction. In less than half a decade, the Maltese parliament raised and ratified the Civil Unions Act (Legislation Malta, 2014) and Gender Identity, Gender Expression and Sex Characteristics Act (Legislation Malta, 2015), while gay conversion practices became unlawful. As the 2010s decade drew to a close it seemed both surreal and unbelievable that less than ten years earlier Malta used to be known as a very conservative country, where social opinion - as reflected in politics and policies - was heavily influenced by the Roman Catholic Church to the extent that divorce only became legal in 2011. Despite such admirable and commendable progress, the older LGBT community was consistently overlooked in Maltese policy on ageing, older persons and later life. Although the past decade was highly significant as far as local ageing policy is concerned, as it witnessed the launch of the National Strategic Policy for Active Ageing, National Dementia Strategy, and the National Minimum Standards for Care Homes for Older Persons (Parliamentary Secretariat for Rights of Persons with Disability and Active Ageing, 2013, 2015a, 2015b), such treatises were all characterised by total silence on the needs and interests of LGBT older persons.