Those who know me will know I like to be busy. I live an active life. I also, every so often, need to sleep. And there are a few things that keep me awake at night, one of which is an occasional worry about the future. My future and our future, the future of the organisation I am proud to be chairman of, and the future of wider communal organisations.
My involvement in Jewish Care goes back 25 years, for as long as Jewish Care has existed. It was my late friend, Adam Science, who dragged me along to my first "community meeting". It was a time when all my peers were getting involved in one communal organisation or another. We had watched our parents take the baton of responsibility for the social and welfare needs of the community from their parents. It was only natural that we would do the same. I recognised that I was, at the time, the future of the community and I had a responsibility to the community to do my bit.
Difficult as it is to say, I no longer represent the future but the here and now. I am watching my friends' children getting married and hoping that these young newlyweds will one day take on the baton of responsibility.
However, as I look around at the future, I do worry. While we have some fantastic young people involved in volunteering and fundraising through our Young Jewish Care programme, the sense of responsibility towards communal organisations is not as strong as it was when I first became involved.
The 2013 JPR National Jewish Community Survey, the most comprehensive and reliable snapshot into the community, presented me with some hard evidence to back up my concerns. The report found, unsurprisingly, that increasing numbers of young, secular Jews don't have the affinity with Jewish charities that their parents' or grandparents' generations had.
Our ageing database indicates potential problems ahead
If demand for communal services was declining maybe this wouldn't be such a problem, maybe we would need to accept that times are changing. However, at Jewish Care this is not the case, the demand for services is greater than ever before. The reduction of government funding into social care has undoubtedly resulted in an increasing demand for our services. Being old and Jewish does have its advantages when it comes to quality social care provision. I now want to ensure that the services provided by Jewish Care will still be there should I and indeed future generations need them.
I have been able to develop a successful career at the same time as managing to give a considerable amount of time to communal life. While this has been down to some hard graft along the way, a bit of mazel, and huge amounts of family support, it is also important to recognise that I have worked hard to find the time.
If we want to, most of us can find an extra hour in our week or even month, but it has to really start with the sense of responsibility, the desire to do something. Without this, finding that extra hour or two will be impossible. We have some amazing young volunteers and more Young Jewish Care Patrons than ever, but we know that what we have to date in terms of young supporters and potential future leaders isn't enough to take this organisation forward for the next 25 years. Our ageing database is an indication of a potential problem ahead.
I am inherently a positive person, a glass-half-full man. I am not looking to create a storm in a teacup but to raise awareness of the challenge ahead.
To encourage everyone to think about our unique community and how they could, if they do not already, contribute towards it. Our community has always looked after itself through a partnership between professional staff, volunteers, lay leaders and supporters. Without this partnership, our future will be under threat.
My concern is not unique to Jewish Care. Alongside my colleagues at the Jewish Leadership Council, we are working hard to develop initiatives to engage with the future of our community. We need to find a way to ensure the desire is there alongside the sense of responsibility.
We need to come together to do this. It needs Friday-night-dinner conversations, it needs parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles to urge the next generation to engage, it needs action. We need to increase momentum now, not when I and others of my generation are ready to hang up our boots and pass the baton on.
While I cannot envisage it, I know that one day I will grow old. I also know I may need the support of the very organisation I am leading today.
Maybe, my speaking out now will ensure not only that someone is around for me when I need to be cared for, but for my children and their children. We can't expect something to just be there, we need to work together to ensure it is.
