UK population rises to 61 million

Aug 27 2009

The UK population increased by a record amount last year to top 61 million for the first time, figures revealed.

There were 408,000 more people living here in 2008, the Office for National Statistics said.

That takes the total population to 61.4 million - an increase of more than two million over 2001.

The increase was driven by a baby boom as fertility rates shot up to their highest rates in a generation.

The increase is the highest since modern records began in 1972 and more than twice the increase of 2001 when the population rose by 201,000. The ONS confirmed the increase in population was the highest in nearly 50 years.

In 1962 the population rose by 484,000 and in 1947 the post-war baby boom drove up population levels by more than half a million (551,000).

For the first time in nearly a decade natural changes to the population caused by shifts in birth and death rates have overtaken immigration as the biggest factor affecting population growth.

The vast wave of immigrants who came here from Eastern Europe after the EU expanded in 2004 has slowed to a trickle, as the recession took hold, the figures showed.

Arrivals from the A8 countries of Eastern Europe fell by more than a quarter - 28% - from 109,000 to 79,000 in the year to December last year. More Eastern European immigrants went home in the same period - up by 24% to 395,000. Overall migration levels - the numbers arriving minus those leaving - fell 44% to 118,000 - the lowest since EU enlargement.

The most recent figures showed a huge increase in returns, as the number of A8 workers registering for employment fell 42% to 116,000 in the year to June this year. Chief statistician Karen Dunnell said the emigration was probably due to the economic downturn.