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Commentaries on rural population ageing have invariably noted implications for the provision of targeted housing and services for the elderly ( Joseph and Fuller, 1991) and for the ability of older people to maintain their independence and live out their lives in places of their own choosing ( Joseph and Cloutier, 1991). Such commentaries have tended to assume a degree of stability over time in the economic and social fabric of rural settlements and in the services they provide to their elderly and non-elderly residents. However, over the last 20 years or so this assumption has been challenged repeatedly as successive waves of restructuring have reconfigured rural settlement and servicesystems and redefined community contexts for ageing ( Joseph and Chalmers, 1998; Cloutier-Fisher and Joseph, 2000).