A three-day festival intended to raise the profile of older people in Coventry was launched today.

The Coventry 50+ festival, which is based in the Lower Precinct in the city centre, will offer older people the opportunity to get involved in a number of planned activities including sports, cinema and further education.

The initiative was developed from ideas from Coventry City Council and the Older People’s Forum, and Tim Healy, Coventry Council’s project director of Better Government for Older People, is hoping for a great response.

He said:

"The festival has been set-up through a lot of hard work from many different people, and hopefully that will be recognised through the turnout.

"As far as I know there is nothing like it anywhere else in the country so it really is a leading initiative for older people and we are hoping other towns and cities will follow that example.

"There are a whole load of planned events and if an over 50 wants to do a bungee jump, learn how to play golf or start using the Internet this will be there for them.

"Not only is there the drop-in centre in the Lower Precinct but there is also a number of activities going on at the Coventry Canal Basin including an Internet display by CWN which is being held on a narrow boat!"

Project Co-ordinator Cathryn Goodwin is delighted that the idea has got off the ground and is hoping that if successful, it will develop into an annual event.

She said:

"This has been in the pipeline for around two years but we did not get given the go-ahead until April or May so since then everything has moved quite quickly.

"The council has very kindly given us the usage of three adjoining retail units that are currently not let and we have approached a whole range of different organisations to get them involved."