LONDON (Reuters Life!) — British children's weekly pocket money has fallen to a seven-year low, in a sign parents are still cutting back on non-essential spending even as the country emerges from recession, a survey showed.

Halifax, part of Lloyds Banking Group, said average pocket money fell to £5.89 ($9.23) a week in 2010 from £6.24 in 2009.

The new figure is the lowest weekly sum since 2003 when parents paid an average of £5.79.

Children's pocket money has fallen despite a small rise in their parents' wages over the past year.

Average weekly pay in Britain in the three months to July was £431 excluding bonuses, 1.8 percent more than a year earlier.

Parents paid daughters less pocket money than sons, in a parallel to the gender gap in the earnings of grown-ups.

Girls received an average £5.70 pounds a month, compared to £6.08 a month for boys, a difference of around six percent compared to 12 percent between men and women in full-time work.

Halifax based its data on a survey of 1,204 children aged between eight and 15 conducted from August 26 to September 2.