Getting a job after 50 is easier said than done

I am fed up with the government claiming that half a million professionals aged over 50 are reluctant to get back to work. They make it sound like we’re all on cruises, gardening or watching telly. But have they actually tried getting a job after the age of 50?

I’m not doing nothing, I hasten to add. Part-time, I run a successful, if tiny, NGO, producing plays with refugees. Our work is studied at universities all over the US and Europe. I write books and screenplays and I once made a film that got into Cannes. But none of this has yet translated into the security provided by cold hard cash, so I spend half my time applying for jobs.

I have had dozens of interviews over the past two years. I always get down to the last three, but never any further.