All the EU countries are experiencing demographic trends and family changes which necessitate responses by government. Developments include increases in the elderly population and a decline in birth rates to well below population replacement levels (40 per cent below in countries such as Italy and Spain). Alongside these are declining marriage rates and rising rates of unmarried cohabitation; the growth of extra-marital fertility (now 30 per cent in the UK); higher rates of divorce and the multiplication of one-parent families; and high rates of workforce participation by mothers of dependant children. All these have implications for public expenditure, social legislation and welfare, and in many countries there is a lively debate about the need for a coherent "family policy", at both national and European levels.
Some European countries claim already to have an explicit family policy. In the case of France this has a more or less overt pronatalist thrust, but in other countries too the population issue is bound into wider considerations of provisions for the family. Major themes in European debates include the boundaries between the State and the family in the provision of care and welfare, the economic and social consequences of low fertility and an ageing population, the status and well-being of children, and the reconciliation of domestic and work responsibilities. Many matters concerning fiscal policy, the future of the Welfare State, industrial organisation and individual welfare are perceived as having a family dimension, which is why the concept of "family policy" is attracting attention. It may be asked, therefore, where the UK stands in all this.
All commentators agree that the UK does not have a "family policy" in any well understood political sense. By this is meant that there exists no explicit and co-ordinated public programme with clearly defined intentions towards the family. Unlike the case of many EU countries, there is no constitutional sanctification of the family. There is no autonomous or distinctive area of social policy which bears the label "family", and "family policy" barely figures in public discourse or the programmes of political parties. Social policy debates are not especially conducted in a family context, and social statistics often lack a family dimension, so that it is sometimes difficult to consider a policy issue from a family perspective. With a marginal recent exception, there are no specific instruments of family policy in the form of, for example, designated ministers, administrative agencies or high advisory councils.
The absence of an explicit family policy does not mean, of course, that the family goes unregarded by politicians or policy-makers, or that families are unaffected by the actions and decisions of governments. The UK obviously does have numerous measures and benefits which are of consequence to families, and the range of these is broadly similar to that in other EU countries. Furthermore, benefits for families do not necessarily suffer unduly from international comparison. Public provision for childcare and pre-school education, for example, is comparatively low, but the UK’s cash benefit provision for children of low paid parents ranks among the top three in a European league, and the child benefit package overall lies in the middle of the league.
The essential point, however, is that the various relevant provisions are not conceptualised in the UK as collectively constituting a "family policy". They are not guided by any set of explicit strategic objectives for the family, or by any family-specific institutional means for co-ordination or monitoring. Indeed, functional divisions within and between administrative departments militate against co-ordinated provision, so that from a family perspective there is a disparate set of measures which contains gaps, overlaps and anomalies. Beyond this, many relevant policies have a marked quality of indirectness. For example, policies may be seen as only incidentally family policies, with objectives defined in other than family terms and entitlement categories based on non-family criteria such as age or disability. Alternatively, objectives may be defined not in terms of the family in general but only of families, especially those which can be defined as somehow vulnerable or deviant. In some cases services may be deputed to non-governmental agencies, thus emphasising only an arm’s length role for the State (marriage counselling is an example).
Governmental abstention from explicit family policy-making stems partly from the tradition in British thought which sees the family as essentially within the private domain, and thus poses the philosophical problem of how to legitimate the intrusion of the State. Despite this, however, there are some recent indications that the concept of family policy may be gaining somewhat in public currency. The Labour party, in opposition, has formed a committee to consider family matters and has deputed a front-bench member to have responsibility for family affairs. The Commission on Social Justice (sponsored by the party to review the future of welfare) includes a family dimension in its field of interest, and an influential left-wing think-tank has published a paper which specially conceptualises an area of action as "family policy". Meanwhile, a government minister has speculated publicly about the need for more co-ordination in policies affecting the family and for instruments to facilitate this. In March 1994 the government announced that the current Minister for Health will also be known as Minister for the Family, although this is not necessarily the major step it may seem. There appears to be no transfer of responsibilities form other ministers, for example, and no additional resources, although the newly-designated minister will answer for the government on family matters. All these moves may well herald the emergence of more explicit approaches to policy-making for the family, although at present the political use of the term family policy" remains hesitant and vague.
In summary, the UK does not have an explicit "family policy", and policies which affect the family are marked by qualities of indirectness and segmentation. There have been no formal instruments of family policy, and it is unclear whether the recent designation of a minister for the family will prove to be a move of any substance. The family policy climate is shaped both by long-term philosophical and political influences and by a newer politicisation of family issues which together inhibit the articulation of general family policy objectives. Current debates tend to spring from the need for policy responses to changing patterns of family behaviour, but there is no parliamentary or public consensus, and many aspects of policy affecting families are now subsumed into general reviews of the Welfare State. It may also be said that the governmental and non-governmental actors in the family policy process are highly differentiated, and that the generality of families tend not to be directly represented in the cultivation of policy. There are numerous policy provisions and benefits of direct consequence to families, but these lack both conceptual and administrative co-ordination. Without some established policy instruments and some integrating perspectives the UK seems unlikely to put itself on the path towards a manifest and coherent policy for the family.
Bob Chester