More women in Britain are having more babies
Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009The average number of children born to each woman in Britain has risen from 1.63 in 2001 to 1.96 in 2008, the highest since 1973.
The baby-boom is fuelled by rising fertility rates as well as immigration. The population of the United Kingdom has now reached 61 million.
More than a quarter of a million children were born last year as fertility rates reached the highest levels in a generation according to the Office of National Statistics.
The rise in births helped to increase the overall population in the country by 408,000, the biggest annual rise since 1962.
Births are increasing because women born in Britain are having more babies and also because the number of women of child-bearing age has risen by 20 per cent because of immigration since 2001.
There were 791,000 babies born in 2008, an increase of 33,000 on the previous year. More than half of this rise came from births to mothers born outside Britain, but living in the UK.
In London, 55 per cent of all births were to mothers born outside the country.
Roma Chappell, deputy director of demography at the ONS, said that the changes to the overall fertility rates were highly significant.
“It’s actually quite exciting because it’s the highest fertility rate we have seen in the UK for some time. You have to go all the way back to 1973 to find a time when the fertility rate went higher,” she said.


