An 81-year-old as shadow leader of the house? Hear hear

Opportunity comes from crises and it knocked last week for Paul Flynn, the MP for Newport West. At 81, he became the oldest frontbencher since William Gladstone when Jeremy Corbyn, 67, made him shadow leader of the House of Commons.

Flynn points out there are more women and minorities on the front bench than ever before (although still not enough), but no octogenarians. “It is important for us to have people advocating in parliament who can remember life before there was a health service,” he says.

I live in a village surrounded by octogenarians. I love being called “young man” (I’m 41) but at times still fall into the easy temptation of intergenerational cursing, especially when elderly gentlemen in venerable Jaguars speed past me and my three young children on a narrow pavement. Before the referendum I overheard an old couple blaming migrants for their struggle to get an appointment at the surgery; in my less humane moments, I’ve blamed my elderly neighbours for being unable to get a doctor’s appointment for my children. Neither of us, of course, is correct.

I was reminded of the importance of understanding how older people experience the world when chatting to my 86-year-old grandfather-in-law over the weekend. He drives a similar car to mine. I pay £265 for car insurance; he pays £1,300 – despite not crashing in six decades of motoring.

His car is crucial for his life, as it is for many older people: every Sunday at 6am he packs it with bolts, latches and doorknobs (he’s the go-to man for bargain doorknobs in east Norfolk) and supplements his pension at car-boot sales.

Perhaps more age-aware policymaking is on its way. A good example is provided by a report by the Older Drivers Task Force calling for T-junctions to be replaced by mini roundabouts: these, and other simple road design measures, make it easier for older motorists and safer for us all.

I’m with Flynn on this. With prime ministers getting younger and policy wonks perennially youthful, there a strong case for more octogenarian input into lawmaking, but let it happen in the Commons, not just in the unelected House of Lords.

Stinky fleeces can save us all

Though fleeces may be the favoured plumage of the birdwatcher, nature-lovers may soon need to shed them. We feel smug, as well as warm, when told that fleeces are made from recycled plastic bottles. Unfortunately, the microfibres in synthetic clothing are even more damaging to the environment. Researchers at the University of California have found that synthetic fleece jackets release 1.7g of microfibres each time they are washed; older jackets shed almost twice as many fibres as new ones. These toxic plastic fragments enter rivers, lakes and oceans, are consumed by fish and potentially accumulate up the food chain. Apart from not buying synthetic clothes, there’s an obvious adaptation: we need to wash them less, if at all. Stinky fleeces can save the world.

Today the ozone layer …

We’re so enveloped in bad news that it’s easy to miss the good: the hole in the ozone layer appears to be healing. Two million cases of skin cancer have been averted. Best of all, it’s happened through global action by human beings. All hail the Montreal protocol, an international treaty ratified in 1987 by United Nations members that demanded the eradication of CFCs in products. We can indeed act sensibly, collectively, and in the interests of the future of life on Earth. We just need to do it a bit more often.