Rethinking the residual policy response: Lessons from Hong Kong older women's responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This article examines older women's experiences of searching for face masks and handling mask-related issues during COVID-19. Set within the context of the Hong Kong government's policy reaction to the shortage of masks in early 2020, the article draws on interviews with 40 older women in Hong Kong to identify their various forms of vulnerability to welfare threats and their active and diverse responses in times of crisis. The findings reveal the implications of the government's residual policy response for people's vulnerability to welfare threats. They also carry practical implications for the support that social workers can provide.

Adult Worker Model Typologies: Examining Work-Family Policies in Fifteen European Countries.

This article aims to advance the discussion of government policies for improving women's work and family life. It focuses on exploring whether it is reasonable to expect that the supported adult worker model will play an important role in guiding governments to reduce the gender employment gap and, at the same time, increase women's resources for strengthening their control over family and work life. This model posits that governments should take a proactive approach to encouraging women to take part in formal employment, such as providing care support measures. To examine the impact of the model, this article develops an 'input adult worker model typology' and an 'output adult worker model typology' using cluster analysis of comparative data covering 15 countries. The findings show that it is important not to overestimate the impact of the supported adult worker model on reducing the gender employment gap or increasing women's control over their lives in most of the 15 countries. The evidence generated from these typologies highlights the difficulties involved in promoting women's welfare despite the use of the adult worker model as a substitute for the male-breadwinner model.

Defamilisation/familisation measures and pensions in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

This article discusses the link between familisation measures (to lower the negative consequences of participating in the family as a care-provider) and defamilisation measures (to reduce individual responsibility for providing care in the family), and pensions for women. To enhance women's chance of having a secure retirement life, it makes two suggestions: government should provide defamilisation measures to assist women to accumulate pension income through work-based pension measures; and government should provide familisation measures extensively as an alternative to these measures. It also demonstrates how the case examples of Hong Kong and Taiwan provide support to these two suggestions.

Familization risks, defamilization risks and older women.

This article is about the familization and defamilization risks faced by older women. Such risks are generated by the lack of one or both of two conditions: the freedom to choose whether or not to perform certain family roles; and the capacity to maintain a reasonable standard of living. Examples are drawn from findings of a qualitative study in Hong Kong, in which 40 older women aged 65 or above were interviewed to discuss their experiences of issues relating to the risks and their diverse preferences of how these issues should be handled.

The effects of defamilization and familization measures on the accumulation of retirement income for women in the UK.

This article is concerned with the link between the effects of pro-market pension reforms on women and familization/defamilization measures. It aims to contribute to the study of this link in three ways. Firstly, it identifies defamilization/familization measures that have the potential to reduce negative effects of pro-market pension measures on women. Secondly, based on the examples from the United Kingdom, it shows that the government's willingness to provide sufficient defamilization/familization measures to assist women to deal with the negative effects of the pro-market pension measures should not be taken for granted. Thirdly, it suggests ways for tackling this problem.

Bridging the language barrier: the use of interpreters in primary care nursing.

Language barriers present a major obstacle to minority ethnic communities accessing primary healthcare. Whereas it is recognised that interpreting services are generally inadequate and inappropriate reliance is placed on family members to interpret, little is known about how nurses working in primary care utilise interpreters to overcome language barriers. The present paper reports on a study examining the utilisation of interpreting services by a range of primary care nurses from the perspectives of the nurses, interpreters and minority ethnic communities. Focus groups were undertaken with five separate groups of district nurses, health visitors, practice nurses, community midwives and specialist nurses, three groups of interpreters from different interpreting services, and five groups of participants from the main community languages in the locality where the study was undertaken (i.e. Arabic, Bengali, Cantonese, Somali and Urdu). Focus group discussions were tape-recorded and subsequently transcribed. Data analysis drew upon the principles of 'framework' analysis. The use of interpreters by primary care nurses varied considerably. Nurses who had received training in using interpreters and who had most control over the timing of patient visits were more likely to use interpreting services. Inadequate training of both nurses and interpreters adversely affected the quality of interaction where interpreters were used. Primary care nurses acted as gatekeepers to interpreting services. Whereas interpreting services were generally perceived to be inadequate, many nurses were accepting of the status quo and prepared to rely on family members to interpret rather than champion the need to improve services.