FAMILY LIFE HAPPY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 225, 22 September 1932, Page 6

FAMILY LIFE HAPPY.

AN ENGLISH INVESTIGATION,

Family life in Great Britain is not in danger of collapse, according to Sir William Beveridge. It is not suffering Trom changes brought about by modern conditions, and any change which has come in regard to it is, on the whole, a change for the better.' This is the verdict of Sir William, after a survey of some 8000 questionnaires dealing with family life which have .been answered by members of the middle-class British public. He has published his "first impressions" in a small volume, "Changes in Family Life" (says a London message to the "Christian Science Monitor"). As a first impression, Sir William declares that Great Britain possesses a vast mass of "happy families. Families which have problems and struggles, but do not get into divorce courts or bankruptcy courts or police courts, or become the subjects of charity or official investigation." The greater part of Sir William's hook is devoted to the reproduction of six talks given over the wireless early this spring by himself and others. The British Broadcasting Corporation issued forms to l>eople who asked for them, explaining that these should be filled up by the recipients and examined, upon completion, by Sir William, on behalf of the London School of Economics. Fifty thousand forms were distributed, and, at the time of publishing the book, 8000 had been returned., This 8000 represented some 20,000 families and some 200,000 persons. Sir William points out that of every 100 forms only about 20 came from families where the husband was a wage-earner; 55 came from families where he was salaried; 10 came from employers; 15 from people working on their own account. The great hulk of the forme— nearly two-thirds of them—came from people with between £300 and £800 a year. Hlummating answers came in reply to questions dealing with the general changes between the past, present and future generations; with the relations—especially the economic relations—between husbands and wives, between parents and children, between brothers and sisters; with the forces which tend to_ bind or loosen the ties of family life. Surprisingly little change of a revolutionary character is recorded in regard to any of these relationshine. The changed formal position of the wife is credited with the "better companions-hip" of married couples. Parents and children are recorded as better companions to one another because they have become, in this generation, more nearly equal in their general relationships than they were in the last. The greater freedom of youth is held responsible for a better choice of married partners. There are, says Sir William, some changes, but the real changes are less' than the apparent or formal changes. There has been a loosening of family ties and authority, but a strengthening of real ties. As the contributor of one form puts at, "A lot of sham family loyalty has been lost, but I do not find any lack of readiness to co-operate in a happy family life."