How much does the condition of our housing affect our health? This timely new study looks in detail at the impact poor housing has on health, using data from the National Child Development Study (NCDS). It provides important information to inform the current debate on Our Healthier Nation and to strengthen arguments for health, housing and social care agencies to work together. It focuses on three main areas: if, and when, housing deprivation impacts on overall health; the link between overcrowding and respiratory and infectious disease; housing deprivation and health in the context of other possible influences on health. The study uses the innovative approach of creating indices for both the severity of ill-health and housing deprivation. These indices are incorporated into an analysis of the impact over time of housing deprivation upon health. The authors conclude that housing plays a significant role in health outcomes and hence provides support for the argument that addressing housing deprivation should be central to thinking about health improvement. Home Sweet Home? is essential reading for researchers and students in housing, public health, urban renewal, and social policy as well as professionals working in these areas.

The story of a man who gives up the rock 'n' roll dream... to play bowls. Alex Marsh wanted to be a rock star - but it didn't work out. Instead he toiled away in the big city - only to give up his career, move to rural Norfolk, and become a househusband. But he isn't a very good one. Whilst his pride won't let him admit it, he struggles with the cooking, the housework and the isolation. He hires a cleaner without telling his wife, his repertoire of baked potatoes exhausts quickly. He becomes hooked on daytime television and computer solitaire. He is in danger of becoming weird. So he takes up bowls. In Sex & Bowls & Rock and Roll we follow a season in the life of the village bowls team, a group of amateur sportsmen and mild eccentrics. In doing so we see this unfashionable pastime in a whole new light, and very funny it is too. But Alex hasn't quite given up on his dreams of rock stardom. Discovering that some of his mates down the pub are a bit handy with bass and drums he makes one final stab at being in a band, with an eagerly awaited local gig. It is a complete disaster. Join Alex has he comes to terms with life as a domestic disappointment, attempts to learn the fine art of bowls and finally realises that supporting the Sultans Of Ping at the Pink Toothbrush in Rayleigh really was the highpoint of his musical career. Sex & Bowls & Rock and Roll is a hilarious account of the life of a genuinely modern man. Everyone will recognise themselves (or their husbands) and you will be hard pressed not to laugh out loud.

While the future shape and direction of housing policy is uncertain, the process of transformation looks set to continue. A wide range of housing policy initiatives emerged during the first term of the New Labour government and 2000 saw the publication of the first major policy statement on housing for over 10 years - the government's much anticipated Housing Green Paper. This book makes a distinctive and innovative contribution to the debate. Bringing together leading scholars from the fields of housing law and housing policy, it aims to engage with the central concerns of policy and to demonstrate that the parallel debates of housing studies and socio-legal studies can be strengthened by a fuller exchange of ideas. Each chapter examines a key theme in contemporary housing policy and seeks to locate policy in relation to broader theoretical debates about the provision of social welfare. Two steps forward is essential reading for academics, students and policy makers with an interest in housing policy and law, as well as students on wider social policy, public administration, policy and management courses.

The issue of homelessness has become extremely important in policy debates during the 1990s. Yet analysis that links the phenomenon of homelessness to wider debates about the changing social and economic environment remains relatively underdeveloped. This important new book brings together contemporary theoretical debates and original empirical research in order to explore the nature, experience and impact of social change in the new 'landscape of precariousness', in which new sets of risks and uncertainties have emerged. It adopts a multi-disciplinary approach, which is essential in developing a more subtle understanding of both the complex processes leading to, and the experience of, homelessness. Central to contemporary theory and practice is the enhancement of our understanding of how homelessness, disadvantage and social exclusion impact differently on various social groups. Homelessness provides a strong contribution to the academic debate, and is essential reading for students and researchers in a range of subject areas, including housing studies, social policy, socio-legal studies and public administration.