Social Policy Digest.

This article presents references to various items published in the "Journal of Social Policy" during May-July 1996. The 1994/5 Family Resources Survey shows that three in four households get some form of social security benefit and that 31 per cent of households have no savings, excluding housing and pensions. The average household in Wales now has a lower gross weekly income than in Northern Ireland. Overall, the North/South divide continued to narrow in 1994. The government used research on male earnings mobility to argue that large numbers of people are not trapped on low earnings which are falling over time. The Health Committee called for resources to be transferred to inner-city health authorities from the Home Counties. A survey from the National Association of Health Authorities and Trusts showed some health authorities considering introducing explicit rationing. The Nursery Education and Grant-Maintained Schools Act received royal assent, enabling nursery education vouchers to go nationwide in April 1997.