Many of the volunteers who help out with food banks, prison visitor schemes, historical walks, art galleries and the like (Letters, 10 December) are fit, healthy pensioners who are happy to give up a couple of hours or days a week to do their bit, perhaps out of guilt as much as altruism: we are, after all, the ones who benefited from free healthcare and education, and built up decent pension pots.
Where is the next generation of volunteers going to come from? It won’t be an option for the Waspi women who now have to work for an extra four or five years, or anyone faced with working until they are 68 to get their state pension. Nor will it be the hard-pressed carers of elderly relatives (some with boomerang children and even grandchildren under their roof). And as for the millennials, with their debts, gig-economy jobs and derisory pension schemes: not much room for optimism there either.
Ruth Eversley
Paulton, Somerset
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