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Underscoring the country’s demographic challenges, official figures showed deaths outnumbered births for the first time in five non-pandemic years, with immigration driving Britain’s fastest population growth since the early 1970s.
The UK’s population is estimated to be 68.3 million in mid-2023, an increase of 1% compared to mid-2022, the Office for National Statistics said on Tuesday. This is the fastest annual growth rate since comparable data became available in 1971.
Britain’s population growth slowed to around 0.5% between 2017 and 2019, down from an average of 0.8% over the previous decade, and fell sharply during the pandemic. The recent rapid population growth rate was due to net international migration, with an increase of 677,300 people.
Without immigration, Britain’s population would have fallen for the first time in half a century, excluding the pandemic. Across the UK, deaths exceeded births by 16,300, marking the first negative natural change in the UK since the mid-1970s, with the exception of 2020. This trend reflects declining birthrates and will continue to Features About future population trends.
Professor Tony Travers of the London School of Economics said the contrast between the sharp rise in net immigration and the decline in natural population change was “staggering”. He added that Sir Keir Starmer’s government would “almost certainly” bring immigration down from this high level.
Jonathan Portes, professor of economics and public policy at King’s College London, also expects population growth to slow sharply in 2024 as net immigration returns to more normal levels. He added: “In the longer term, these figures support the UK’s growing reliance on immigration to cushion the long-term decline in both birth rates and the working-age population.”
The surge in net immigration was a blow to the last Conservative government and was the subject of intense debate in the run-up to July’s general election, which Labor won in a landslide. Mr Starmer met with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni last month to seek advice on tackling illegal immigration.
Immigration was the main driver of population growth in all four UK countries, according to the ONS.
The population growth rate was 1% in England and Wales, faster than Scotland’s 0.8% and Northern Ireland’s 0.5%. Scotland led the decline in natural population change, with 19,000 fewer births than deaths.
Madeleine Sumption, director of Oxford University’s Migration Observatory, said population growth “can help meet fiscal challenges, but only if newcomers are at higher levels of the skill and salary spectrum.” said.
He added that population growth is also putting pressure on housing costs, and that “maintaining current living standards requires further investment in infrastructure such as roads and hospitals.”
