So Happy Together

Germany's Family Minister Ursula von der Leyen was in Salzgitter in northern Germany on Monday for the opening of the country's first "multi-generation home."

The Salzgitter home is the prototype for an initiative that aims to provide care and support for the family around the clock. According to the German government's plans, there should be 439 of these establishments nationwide by 2009 with 150 of them should already be up and running by the end of this year.

Each home will receive 40,000 euros ($51,264) a year from the state. The government has already allocated 98 million euros for the project to be used over the next five years.

The "multi-generation homes" should provide "reliable points of contact for all generations," von der Leyen said at the opening. She said she hopes such homes will help re-establish the family as a secure institution and thus promote social cohesion.

Return to familiar mutual help

"Earlier the large family was made strong by the principle of mutual help," the minister said. "Today too, young families and older people need to know that there is a network on which they can rely."

The project's stated aim is to help relieve the increasing pressures on parents trying to combine a working life with a family life by providing in-house facilities. The plan hopes grandparents will help children with their homework or baby-sit, and if they can no longer drive younger people will take them shopping or on excursions.

Much of the work in these homes will be carried out on a voluntary basis but there will also be strong links with the local economy, according to von der Leyen. For example, there might be a washing and ironing service for employed people with too little time to do their own or a night cafe for people who cannot get to sleep because of illness or psychological problems.

Older generations' knowledge benefits young people

Although this is a German initiative, von der Leyen said she would like it to influence decisions being made within the European Union, suggesting that a databank be established to compile information about former measures in order to ascertain what actually works in terms of family policy and what does not.

"There has never been such a healthy and well-educated older generation," she said, adding that it was necessary to make use of this generation's knowledge for the benefit of the whole society, claiming that the "silver economy" was a concept that should not be underestimated.