French Put Television Before Bathrooms

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31520, 7 November 1967, Page 3

French Put Television Before Bathrooms

(N.Z.P. A.-Reuter —Copyright) PARIS. One in every two French families owns a television set, a motor-car and a refrigerator. But millions of homes have no bathrooms. This is shown by a series of surveys being made throughout the country by the National Institute of Statistics and other public bodies. France has enjoyed an immense boom in expensive household gadgets and luxuries in the last 10 years, but has been slow to acquire other, more basic amenities of modem living. Fifty-two per cent of families interviewed by the institute recently had television sets, compared with a meagre 1 per cent in 1953. Fifty-one per cent had cars, compared with 21 per cent 13 years ago, and by the start of the holiday season in July, 12 per cent more new cars had been registered in France this year than by the same time in 1966. >

The number of refrigerators in France has more than doubled in six years, and three out of every five families now have one. Radio sets are almost everywhere. More than 85 per cent of homes can boast one. Fewer and fewer wives have to toil over the sink to scrub their husband’s shirts, as 55 per cent of households own washing machines. But the wave of apparent affluence is deceptive. Many poorer families interviewed in industrial or country areas had cars and televisions, but only a cold running water supply. One survey showed that as many as 43 per cent of French homes still have no bathrooms. This is nevertheless a slight improvement on 1962, when an estimated 60 per cent of households did not even have a wash-basin and had to use the kitchen sink. France also lags behind many Western countries in the availability of telephones. But although many Frenchmen may have to go to the local public baths to wash and use public call-boxes to make their telephone calls, they

make no sacrifices In one area of household expenditure—namely, food. Surveys show that the traditional French love of good food and drink is as strong as ever. The average family spends 36 per cent of its income on food, and up to onequarter of this goes on wine and other alcoholic drinks. The tradition of eating well is reflected even in the way in which the French build their homes. The surveys found that while 94 per cent of families had a diningroom and 76 per cent a kitchen, only 15 per cent had a separate sitting room. It seems that it will be a long time, too, before the French take to processed vegetables and pre-packed foods. One in every two households still grows its own vegetables, and one in four raises chickens and rabbits for the dinner table.