The Beveridge Committee of 1942 is often assumed to have based its proposals for social security scales on a poverty line at the ‘human needs’ or social participation level. This is because of its ‘principle of adequacy of benefit in amount and time’. Using the Committee's working papers, this paper describes the discussions of the committee about the ideas of need and measures of poverty to be used. The evidence shows that the Committee knew very well that its proposed benefit levels were not enough for social participation. Because it consciously implemented the principles of minimum subsistence and less-eligibility in the face of inadequate wages, the proposed scales were arguably more austere even than Rowntree's ‘primary poverty’ standard which both he and Beveridge acknowledged was not sufficient to meet human social needs. Whether muddle or mendacity, this mystification has had serious consequences for the poor in Britain.

The paper looks at the relative importance of state benefits, employer benefits and private sources in supporting early retired men. Using data from various administrative sources, the General Household Survey and the Family Expenditure Survey, it shows how the increase in early retirement which occurred between 1979 and 1986 went hand in hand both with a greater reliance on means-tested benefits and a greater reliance on employer benefits. Although the income of the early retired was well above the minimum accorded by the ‘income support’ system, there were major differences between subgroups of the early retired—those dependent solely on state benefits and those with other sources of income, private and personal—and these differences have become more pronounced over time. Finally, the paper looks at the total costs of early retirement: to the state, to employers and to the early retired themselves. Total costs ballooned between 1979 and 1986. Much of the extra expenditure on benefits fell on employers, but the early retired themselves, through accepting a considerable reduction in their income, bore the bulk of the costs of early retirement.

Co-residence between adult children aged 35 or more and their elderly parent(s) or parent(s)-in-law has been investigated using data from the Office of the Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS) Longitudinal Survey and the 1985 General Household Survey supplement on informal carers. Overall 4 per cent of adults lived with a parent or parent-in-law but this proportion varied considerably with age, marital status and gender. Socio-economic differentials in co-residence were also found. These suggested that where the child is the provider of support to an elderly parent co-residence may be associated with socio-economic advantage. Differentials in co-residence rates and differences between co-residence data from the Longitudinal Study (LS) and data on co-resident carers from the General Household Survey (GHS) also point to the important role of elderly people as providers of support to adult children. In conclusion, the implications of these data for policies of community care are considered.

School meals today are provided on a compromise basis; some pupils are charged and others are not. The compromise thus rejects two types of universalistic principles: allocating private benefits by the market and provision of merit goods collectively free of charge. The article examines, empirically and conceptually, the changing meaning of school meals; the demand and supply of school meals and the allocation of public subsidies to non-needy children; conflicting goals of expert nutritionists, egalitarians, redistributionists, efficient managers, and parents and children. The article concludes by considering political constraints on rationalising the programme in the name of universalistic principles. These constraints include the inheritance of commitments from previous governments, collective responsibility of spending and Treasury ministers; intra-party divisions between frontbench and backbench MPs; and low political salience of charging as an issue.

A decline in the number of young people entering the UK labour force has led to growing interest in the recruitment and retention of women workers. As yet the child care needs of school age children have not been addressed. Using interview data the strategies mothers employ to meet their work commitments outside of school hours and during childhood illnesses are described. Although mothers remained the main carers of their children, they frequently depended on unpaid help from relatives. These informal arrangements were sometimes complicated and potentially vulnerable. This dependence on informal support networks has a range of policy implications.