WATCH – 85-year-old raps to save elderly care in Wester Ross community of Ullapool hammering home a heartfelt message: 'We want to die with dignity'
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Retired social worker Jill Beavitt (85) is protesting the closure of Mo Dhachaidh, an Ullapool care home. with a rap to raise awareness about the lack of elderly care in the north–west Highlands.
Jill was inspired to write the rap after she attended a packed community meeting about the closure of the local nursing care home, Mo Dhachaidh, which is Gaelic means 'My Home'.
Parklands Care Homes had sparked a shocked response when it announced Mo Dhachaidh care home, which they had taken over last August, would close. Locals have expressed deep concerns over the future of rural social care, as Mo Dhachaidh was one of the two nursing homes serving the entire north–west Highlands, from Kyle of Lochalsh to Durness.
A petition was then started by Ullapool residents, which has gained over 800 signatures, calling for restoration of the essential north–west care home.
Over 50 people went out on a Sunday evening in late February, many such as Jill travelling considerable distances, to discuss what action might be taken to save the home. As the meeting closed, local resident Tim Gauntlett said: "We want to die with dignity".
Jill was so affected by this statement that she wrote a rap, and asked her friend Anne Wood to accompany her on fiddle. A further seven concerned local people, then joined the rap performance.
Jill said: "I have worked in Mo Dhachaidh, and been a social worker for the elderly. Before Mo Dhachaidh was built we had to send people all over the place, and I really hated that part of my job.
"What carers do in the community is wonderful and miraculous."
After the rap performance, Jill was back on the road headed for her ferry, making the long trek home to the rural peninsula of Scoraig.
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Tim Gauntlett, Mo Dhachaidh rap group member, said: "We should all live with the assurance that as we move closer to this final stage of our lives, that our services are professional and have the ability to support us and our families, to the very end, of which a nursing home is part of that spectrum of care.
"We all want to die with dignity so that we can face our fears and anxieties with a minimum of pain.”
