A vivid picture of the life of the average family in Britain is given in ╥Britain, an official handbook, 1961╙ which is published today (HMSO, 25s). It has been prepared by the Central Office of Information and contains a mass of statistics of the life of the nation. It deals with the national economy, industry, the trade unions, farming, financial aid to overseas development, the National Health Service, employment, the monarchy and
Parliament, the law, education, social welfare, and scores of other topics.
The average married couple, it states, has a television set and a vacuum cleaner, possibly a washing machine and refrigerator, has a small bet occasionally, and does its own house decorating.
The vanishing servant
The man of the house works from 42 to 46 hours per week, not counting overtime, and in many cases his wife works, too. One third of the married women have paid jobs, and half the women working for pay are married.
Fewer than 5 per cent of housewives employ paid help and fewer than 1 per cent have a resident servant. There were only 178,000 resident domestic servants in England and Wales in 1951 compared with 706,800 in the early 1930s.
At least a quarter of the adult population play or watch sport, and three out of four bet occasionally for small stakes on football ╥pools╙ and racing. The cinema remains the most popular form of entertainment outside the home ╤ there are still 3,500, plus 500 theatres ╤ and to young men, women, and older children a visit to the cinema is still a social occasion. Probably at least half of them go as often as once a week.
Gardeners ╤ 19m.
About 5 million go to a dance every week, and there are 3,500 clubs with more than 2 million members affiliated to the Working Men╒s Club and Institute Union, 2,200 Townswomen╒s Guilds, 8,500 Women╒s Institutes in England and Wales, 4,000 horticultural societies, and 19 million spare-time gardeners.
