I WANT to use this year’s United Nations International Day of Older Persons (UNIDOP) to urge every single person in Scotland to take a stand against ageism.

As the Minister with responsibility for promoting older people’s rights, I’m passionate about challenging the negative stereotypes associated with ageing and committed to working with older people and organisations to ensure that their quality of life continues to improve.

Earlier this week I visited DanceBase, the national centre for dance in Edinburgh, and met members of the Golden class. They’re all aged 60 or over and have either never danced before or haven’t danced for a while and want to learn new styles.

But it wasn’t their ages that struck me; it was their energy and enthusiasm and the fun they were having. Dance is a fantastic example of social activity to exercise the body and mind. It’s an opportunity to meet friends and stay active and it can help maintain and improve balance, so reducing the risk of falls.

So today is about celebrating older people and the contribution they make to society, whether they’re grandparents helping with childcare; retired but dedicating their time to voluntary work; or being role models for their communities in a whole host of other ways.

And it’s about making sure we are removing any barriers which could stand in the way of them enjoying healthy, active and independent lives.

We want to help people live independently at home for longer and in the spring we will be refreshing our national strategy on housing for older people.

By 2021 we will have made available more than £1 billion for energy efficiency improvements, helping to make homes warmer and cheaper to heat, in particular for older people who are often among the most affected by increases in energy prices.

We are continuing to fund free travel for older people through the National Entitlement Card and protecting our investment in free personal and nursing care. And as well as funding projects to tackle loneliness and isolation, we are investing in Age Scotland’s Silver Line Scotland free helpline. We will be developing a new Social Isolation Strategy to make sure we are doing all we can to prevent loneliness for anyone, no matter how old they are.

We also want to make sure that older people are making full use of the benefits they are entitled to. We are consulting extensively on a social security bill that will be the foundation for how we use our new social security powers.

Making sure people understand the support that’s available will be a key part of our work. So we will work with advice and support services and other stakeholders to understand better the barriers that prevent people from claiming benefits. We will then address these by raising awareness, supporting people to take up their full benefit entitlement.

We have committed to using our new powers to take a different approach from the UK Government and develop policies based on dignity, fairness and respect that will help remove the stigma attached to accessing the support people are entitled to.

We also asked people across the country to put forward their views on what mattered to them through our Fairer Scotland conversation and we will publish our Fairer Scotland Action Plan next week.

Everyone has a role to play to make sure older people are supported in their communities. Unfortunately, they can face discrimination and I think it’s really important to raise awareness of that, too.

It could range from the seemingly harmless assumption that a person’s ability to work is hindered by their age or it could be excluding them from an activity because of a mobility issue.

But treatment like this can have a huge impact on someone’s confidence and health and prevent them from being able to enjoy life to the full and feel valued, as they should, so that they can contribute fully.

So this international day serves as a reminder that we should all take a moment to check up on and spend time with elderly relatives, friends and neighbours.

If we all do this and challenge any misconceptions that exist, together we will be able to tackle inequalities and remove the barriers that older people face in living fulfilling lives.

Jeane Freeman is Minister for Social Security in the Scottish Government.