The Department for Work and Pensions has published a report entitled ‘Families with Children in Britain: Findings from the 2007 Families and Children Study’.

The report is based on analysis of the Families and Children Study, provides information about children, their parents and families as a whole across a wide range of subjects.

The main findings include the following:

• Almost one-quarter (23 per cent) of children lived in a lone parent family.  Lone parent families were more likely than couple families to live in social housing, to be in the lowest income quintile and to have at least one child with a disability.
• 16+ hours (pw) and 57 per cent of couple families had both partners doing so. Forty one per cent of lone parent households were workless compared with 5 per cent of couple households.
• One in 6 children (17 per cent) lived in a household where no one worked over 16 hrs (pw). The majority of these (11 per cent of all children) were in lone parent households.

Further information is available on the Department for Work and Pensions website.