The number of people living in the United Kingdom will exceed 75 million by the middle of the century, population experts now believe.

 

Rising immigration, a higher birthrate among migrant families and longer lifespans are on course to lift the population by at least 15 million by 2051, from last year's 60 million total. There are fears it could even hit 77 million.

 

The increase will be the equivalent of building two new cities the size of London. It will place enormous demands on housing, transport and public services, and will bring a dramatic change to the nation's ethnic mix.

 

The projection, expected to be confirmed by government population experts this week, represents a big increase from the last prediction, in 2005, which showed the UK's population rising to 69 million by 2051. The new figure will fuel the debate over Labour's policy on immigration controls.

 

Liam Byrne, the immigration minister, has signalled a toughening of the regime by pointing to "the need for swift and sweeping changes to the immigration system". Last night, the Tories renewed their call for a cap on the intake of migrant workers from outside the European Union.

 

Damian Green, the shadow immigration minister, said: "We can't go on like this. Increasing the population gradually is one thing, but a headlong, unplanned rise is creating problems for public services and possible social tensions. This needs urgent action from the Government."

 

Official forecasts of UK population growth are produced every two years by the Government Actuary's Department. They are used in Whitehall to plan public spending.

 

The dramatic change to a two-year-old forecast will be a new blow to official statisticians, already under fire for their inability to count accurately the number of incoming migrants. Mervyn King, the Governor of the Bank of England, has complained that the poor quality of official statistics is hindering his efforts to steer the economy.

 

The extra anticipated growth is due to revised predictions for immigration rates, birthrates and longevity. The "underlying assumptions" on which the new projection will be based were published last month by the Office for National Statistics.

David Coleman, professor of demography at Oxford University, said the new official projection was likely to show the UK's population reaching 69 million in 2031 and 75 million in 2051. His calculation, disclosed in a memo to the House of Lords economic affairs committee, factors in only the revised migration and birthrate figures. The revised longevity could push the 2051 forecast as high as 77 million.

 

Prof Coleman told peers that the proportion of the population that is non-white was on course to grow from 9 per cent at the last census in 2001 to 29 per cent in 2051.

However, forecasting population growth is fraught with difficulty because it depends on the interaction of several unknowns over a period of decades. Even small changes in the birthrate or annual migration levels can have a big impact when forecasters look a long way ahead.

 

Last month, official statisticians raised their long-term estimate for annual net migration to the UK from 145,000 to 190,000. The move followed two years in which record numbers came seeking work here after the 2004 EU expansion.

 

A baby boom among immigrant women has forced the statisticians to raise their estimate for the birthrate of the entire population.

 

Women are now expected to have, on average, 1.84 babies each during their lives, compared with an expectation of only 1.74 two years ago. Foreign-born women living in the UK have, on average, 2.2 children. Pakistani-born women living here have an average of 4.7, whereas British-born women have only 1.6. Last year, 22 per cent of UK births were to foreign-born women.

 

The rapidly growing population will increase demand for housing, putting pressure on green-belt land and shoring up property prices for years to come. Gordon Brown has promised three million new homes by 2020, yet the new forecast suggests that the population by that year will be five million higher than today. A trend for more young people to live alone is also expanding the number of new households.

 

Rising population numbers will also require the building of new schools and hospitals. A bigger tax base will provide the necessary finances. The arrival of working-age migrants and the increase in the birthrate will postpone the "demographic time bomb" - when the number of pensioners becomes too large for the workforce to support.

Prof Coleman told peers: "The impact of an additional 15 million people would obviously be considerable: economic, environmental, social and ethnic…

 

"The absent-minded commitment into which we have drifted, to house a further 15 million people, must be the biggest unintended consequence of government policy of almost any century. As it is by no means unavoidable, being almost entirely dependent upon continued immigration, it might be thought worthy of discussion. In official circles, there has been none."

 

Source : Sunday Telegraph

Doesn't most of the immigration into the UK come from the EU, the numbers of which we are not allowed to limit?

 

As the report also states it will prevent the demographic time bomb from happening for a longer time which is good news for the UK's economy and will give the government longer to plan for this.

 

Immigration has always occured after all the English themselves immigrated to the UK as Angles and Saxons around 1500 years ago, replacing the original Celtic people

Immigration has always occured after all the English themselves immigrated to the UK as Angles and Saxons around 1500 years ago, replacing the original Celtic people

 

......... at a time where there was lots of land available for settlement...

this has been my objections to mass immigration all along. we are a small island with limited resources, we simply cannot carry on letting everyone in.

this has been my objections to mass immigration all along. we are a small island with limited resources, we simply cannot carry on letting everyone in.

 

 

I have to agree! There is no room for anyone.. All our natural land will be taken over for bloody housing!

......... at a time where there was lots of land available for settlement...

 

It was still immigration, and a foreign people arriving on land that was already occupied by a native population, now you deprive the same thing to other people, whats really wrong with immigration? Our population will reach this high and then fall back.

 

Most immigrants benefit this country, more so than the majority of native citizens, we already have tight controls who do you want to deny immigration to, Australians, Canadians, Kiwis, Americans? Or maybe it' non-white immigrants that worry you most

Phew! At least that means there will be enough people working here to pay for my pension. Result!

who do you want to deny immigration to, Australians, Canadians, Kiwis, Americans? Or maybe it' non-white immigrants that worry you most

 

That's a good point you bring up... Every time this issue is discussed it always seems to be in relation to Asian or African immigrants, NEVER immigrants from the US, Canada or Australia... Last time I was in Edinburgh, the place was absolutely FULL of Aussies and Kiwis, yet no one ever seems to mention that..... Funny innit....?

you can't see a local in st andrews during uni term time

 

its an actual joke

That's a good point you bring up... Every time this issue is discussed it always seems to be in relation to Asian or African immigrants, NEVER immigrants from the US, Canada or Australia... Last time I was in Edinburgh, the place was absolutely FULL of Aussies and Kiwis, yet no one ever seems to mention that..... Funny innit....?

 

 

I liked how Australia recovered after having near enough the same problem but now they don't hardly let anyone into the country unless they have something to offer. That's how we should be.

 

Given half the chance I'd live over there rather than watch England become no so England!

but if areas do become overcrowded people will move - abroad or somewhere else

Just as the prediction rose from 69 to 77 million from 2005 to 2007 (give me a break!), the forecasts will always change with trends. 80 years ago in the US, everyone was paranoid that Italian would be the #1 spoken language by 1960, and had immigration levels from Italy sustained 1920 levels, eventually this would have come true.

 

It may sound crazy to think maybe the UK won't be desirable in 50 years but things can change rapidly. How many Irish still emigrate to the UK or the US? And anyway, haven't the number of Polish immigrants to the UK, for instance, decreased with the rapid growth of the Polish economy?

It was still immigration, and a foreign people arriving on land that was already occupied by a native population, now you deprive the same thing to other people, whats really wrong with immigration? Our population will reach this high and then fall back.

 

Most immigrants benefit this country, more so than the majority of native citizens, we already have tight controls who do you want to deny immigration to, Australians, Canadians, Kiwis, Americans? Or maybe it' non-white immigrants that worry you most

 

you (as ever) have totally misreprisented what i said and intentions.

 

there is NO simularity between the anglo saxon invasion (of a POST ROMAN) empire, (immigration was a two way thing too with many celts/ romano british migrating to europe) and the world today.. population in 500ad.... c1.5 million, plenty of space, plenty of room, no problem.

 

my objections are purely on the fact that this tiny island cant support it! reports already show that immigration is putting too much extra strain on hospitals, education, social services... so whatever 'good' they do they aint 'paying their way'.

That's a good point you bring up... Every time this issue is discussed it always seems to be in relation to Asian or African immigrants, NEVER immigrants from the US, Canada or Australia... Last time I was in Edinburgh, the place was absolutely FULL of Aussies and Kiwis, yet no one ever seems to mention that..... Funny innit....?

 

yeah...we are overrun with them arnt we!!! lol

 

never ever heard/seen canadian or aussy in our schools. they are full of eastern europeans! the school i work at now has 28 different nationalities!!!! ffs! half of which can barely speak english and interpreters are being employed at an extra cost to cope!

 

like ive already said... im anti immigration from ALL countries.

my objections are purely on the fact that this tiny island cant support it! reports already show that immigration is putting too much extra strain on hospitals, education, social services... so whatever 'good' they do they aint 'paying their way'.

 

Absolute rubbish mate... If every single immigrant left the country, the economy would collapse, simple as... The majority of immigrants are extremely hard working (especially the Eastern Europeans and Bangladeshis..) and are paying taxes and NI just like you and me (and those who own and run businesses are paying considerably MORE into the system than either of us)... Not paying their way??? Nonsense... As ever your ravings echo that of a BNP pamphlet or the right wing Tabloid press..... If anyone should be chucked out the country, I'd sooner it was the lazy, shiftless, good-for-bugger-all, home-grown chavs who sit on their arses and breed like bloody rabbits expecting US to pick up the tab for their bloody feral brats...... <_<

the school i work at now has 28 different nationalities!!!! ffs!

 

So what??? The University I work at has over a HUNDRED different nationalities..... Is your problem the people themselves or the fact that your nice, green and pleasant land of "merrie olde Englande" becoming a bit different. They're KIDS Rob, they need to learn to speak English, to be actually taught (which is what a school is kinda meant to do, teach people, yeah....?). In another thread you accused me of being a Luddite for not being down with technology (which is absolute rubbish anyway seeing as how I'm typing this post on a COMPUTER on the INTERNET and not sending up smoke signals or using a quill pen.... :lol: the Luddites were against ALL new technology which would've put jobs in jeopardy, I would imagine computers would've been on their "hitlist" had they been around today.... :lol: ), tbh, I think you're much more of a "Luddite" than I am for being so anti-immigration....

 

Tbh, I dunno about this story anyway, The Daily Torygraph is another one of these newspapers like The Daily Mail that I dont really trust and the facts are that every country's populations have risen exponentially for the past 60 years or so, mainly due to the fact that people are living longer and not dying from diseases such as Polio, Typhoid, Cholera, TB, etc, and we dont have world wars..... India's population swelled post WW2 from 500 million to just over a billion as it stands now, China and Russia also saw huge rises in population, as has the US....

80 years ago in the US, everyone was paranoid that Italian would be the #1 spoken language by 1960, and had immigration levels from Italy sustained 1920 levels, eventually this would have come true.

 

It may sound crazy to think maybe the UK won't be desirable in 50 years but things can change rapidly. How many Irish still emigrate to the UK or the US? And anyway, haven't the number of Polish immigrants to the UK, for instance, decreased with the rapid growth of the Polish economy?

 

Of course now, it's Spanish that's becoming the language that's spoken in many parts of the US... :lol:

 

Good point about the Irish, over a million Irish people went to the States in the mid-19th century, just over a quarter of the then population of Ireland.... We've not seen anything like that scale here where a quarter of a country's population has upped sticks and moved to another country.... That would be like 250million Indians just leaving India, or 500 million Chinese leaving China if we were to apply the same proportions to those countries....

 

Given half the chance I'd live over there rather than watch England become no so England!

 

So you want to become an IMMIGRANT yourself while at the same time slagging off immigrants ? :lol:

 

You really need to change your paper from the Daily Mail to something a bit more objective dear

Given half the chance I'd live over there rather than watch England become no so England!

 

Clare, please tell me you do realise the irony of that statement..... Would you seriously wand to become one of these pathetic ex-pat English people residing in places like Marbella, drinking in some fakey, plastic English "theme" pub and not bothering to learn the lingo, like all these insufferably arrogant w/ankers... "They all talk foreign dont they...??" And people complain about immigrants here "not integrating". Well, frankly, all the Asian and African people that I've met speak a very good standard of English, and all are bi-lingual, some even speak a THIRD language (usually French...). Most people from this country seem to struggle with English from my experiences of the local, home-grown chavs and other assorted vermin living around my area....

 

I dont care about "Britain" or "Engerrrrlaaaaaannndddd", it's a virtually meaningless concept anyway, the facts are that the "Engish" and "Celtic" genepools have become so bast*rdised over the many hundreds of years, that neither of them can be considered truly "indigenous".. I used to call myself Scots/Irish or "Celtic", before I actually found out the "Celts" really originated in the Teutonic countries, so what does that really make me.....? You "English" are all a mixture of Romany Gypsy, Roman, German, French and god knows what else.... Did you know the term "Caucasian" actually comes from the Caucasus mountains - in EASTERN Europe.....

 

This has been proven time and time again in various documentaries and genetic research. On one documentary in particular I will NEVER forget the look on this couple's face who were so insistent that they were "pure Anglo Saxon" and then found out that genetically they were more TURKISH and ROMANY...... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: Oh, how I pissed myself... Idiots.....

 

Oh, and the "English" and "Scottish" patron saints are about as British as Mohammed Al Fayed..... In fact, I do believe BOTH originated in the same part of the world Mr Al Fayed hails from, one being Turkish, the other Israeli..... :lol: :lol:

So you want to become an IMMIGRANT yourself while at the same time slagging off immigrants ? :lol:

 

You really need to change your paper from the Daily Mail to something a bit more objective dear

 

Who would want to live here seeing the way it's going? My home town has changed so much in the space of a year and half that's scary! There just isn't room for anyone anymore, why do you think people are packing up and going? I'd rather live somewhere better than this now, crime rate is lower there, less over run..less people like you (I hope)...

 

I thought being a 'successful businessman' and all you'd set your sights higher, it's younger with both cases with you tho innit...

 

Oh my god I'm at work and I actually have work to do how strange, thought I was getting like you then making it all up in my head...

 

I can't say I read it but if I did it would beat your paper The Sun any day of the week.