Mottley announces new senior care villages, expanded support for disabled 

Barbados Labour Party (BLP) leader Mia Mottley has unveiled plans for a network of senior citizens’ and disability support villages across Barbados, as part of a broader programme to strengthen care, housing, and legal protections for the island’s ageing and vulnerable population.

Speaking at a political meeting in Welchman Hall, St Thomas, on Wednesday night, Mottley said the administration had already moved ahead with plans to construct senior citizens’ villages and specialised facilities across the island to better support an ageing population and adults living with disabilities.

She pointed to the work of former St Thomas MP Cynthia Forde and social care minister Kirk Humphrey in advancing legislative protection for the elderly, including the long-awaited Elder Citizens Bill.

“Cynthia Forde did great work helping us with the regime for protecting senior citizens in this country,” Mottley said, adding that Humphrey had been eager to bring the Elder Citizens Bill to Parliament shortly after the election was called.

“He and Cynthia Forde worked on [it] to get it before this country’s Parliament so that you can protect the rights of senior citizens in Barbados. No government has ever put a regime in place like that.”

Mottley stressed that the issue was becoming increasingly urgent, citing demographic trends that show Barbados’ population is ageing rapidly.

“One in every Bajans on current trajectory by 2050, in 24 years, is expected to be over 65,” she said. “Now we anticipate that we have to make some changes there because you need younger people to build a society, but what will not change is that with improving healthcare, we will have larger numbers of elderly people in this country than we would have had to deal with before.”

She warned that failing to plan for this shift would have serious social consequences.

“If we don’t start planning for it, then we are going to have a lot of people crying and a lot of misery in Barbados,” Mottley said.

She also highlighted concrete developments already under way, noting that St Philip has begun construction on a modern senior citizens’ village, separate from the new geriatric hospital currently being built along the ABC Highway.

“I just came from St Philip, and in St Philip what is being built now, separate from the geriatric hospital that you see going up on the ABC Highway, St Philip has already started with the first senior citizens’ village that we have committed to parish by parish,” she said.

The St Philip development will also include a dedicated village designed to support adults living with disabilities, allowing them to live with dignity and appropriate care within their communities.

The initiative was rooted in a deep concern shared by many parents of children with disabilities, Mottley said.

“I have said the greatest fear of any parent is knowing that their disabled child will not be able to take care of themselves when a parent has gone along to a higher place,” she told supporters. “Therefore this country must give those parents the assurance and comfort that we know how to help take care of your children when they become adults.”

Turning specifically to St Thomas, Mottley announced that plans had already been completed for a senior citizens’ village in Edgehill, which she said should move into construction within the next year.

“The second [senior citizen village] for which the plans have already finished, is here in Edgehill, St Thomas,” she said. “I fully anticipate that within the next nine to twelve months, that community at Edgehill will start to be built, and the third one in St George.”

She argued that the parish-by-parish approach reflects a deliberate policy to decentralise services and bring critical support closer to where people live.

“Now a government only does this if it is serious about decentralising services and bringing things to the community, to people,” Mottley said.