UK - What if the most valuable mental health resource for older people… is older people themselves?

UK - What if the most valuable mental health resource for older people… is older people themselves? A report from the Centre for Mental Health makes something clear that the lived experience field knows well: expertise doesn't come only from textbooks or training programs. It comes from living. Dr Lucia Franco, psychologist and lived experience advocate, says it plainly: "Many of us still have a sound mind and a lot of experience and wisdom that younger people don't have. The vast body of knowledge of older people is being entirely disregarded." That's not just a gap in mental health services. That's a waste of human potential. We've built an entire movement around the idea that personal experience of mental health challenges is a form of expertise, something that can and should shape care, policy, and community. But somehow, that logic stops at retirement age. An ervaringsprofessional at 35 is seen as an asset. At 70? Often invisible. The lived experience field needs to ask itself an honest question: Are we practicing what we preach, across the full lifespan? Older people aren't just people who need support. They are people who can give it, with decades of hard-won insight that no curriculum can replicate. At Experience Hub, we believe lived experience has no expiration date. The question is whether our sector is ready to act on that belief.