Sir, - I noted with approval your supplement on pensions in your edition of October 4th. I looked for some mention of the Active Retirement movement in Ireland - in vain, largely because we in the AR movement have been keeping a very low profile. If we do not tell the media about ourselves we can scarcely be critical if you do not know about us.
I will be trying to rectify this - and hopefully to make us an automatic subject of reference in any feature on pensions and older people generally. I am secretary of the Federation of Active Retirement Associations, the umbrella organisation which co-ordinates and administers the activities of about 150 Active Retirement associations throughout the country with a membership of almost 12,000 people.
In due course we hope to be in a position to prompt the media to feature our activities in a prominent way, but we obviously need to do a lot more. Meanwhile, I would just like readers to know that we do exist, and can be reached by phone and fax at 016792142 and e-mail at fara@eircom.net.
We now have a full-time administrator at the above contact who will be pleased to offer further information on our activities. - Yours, etc.,
Bill Murphy, Secretary, Federation of Active Retirement Associations, Shamrock Chambers, 59-61 Dame Street, Dublin 2.