asked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will publish the results, and the cost, of the family finance survey in 1978 and 1979; and whether he intends to make further surveys in this area.
I hope that the basic results of the family finance survey will be ready for publication before the end of this year, though further analytical work on the information is likely to be needed after that. The Department of Health and Social Security, which commissioned the original survey, has also commissioned a follow-up survey of the same sample of families. The costs to the Department, and to the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys, which is conducting the surveys, amount to £608,000—mostly incurred in 1979—for the main survey and £275,000 for the follow-up.