A record number of births had foreign born parents in 2024
Charlie Cole writes for Migration Central on the huge changes taking place in our country.
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The Office for National Statistics (ONS) recently published information on births in England & Wales for 2024, the release is available here and covers the total number of births, the parent country of birth, ethnicity of births, birthweight and other factors.
At a glance, there were 594,677 live births in England & Wales, a slight increase over 2023, but still well below replacement rate and the mini ‘baby boom’ that was observed between 2007 and 2012.
The proportion of births to foreign-born mothers in 2024 stood at 33.9%, the highest on record and an increase from 31.8% in 2023. In isolation, however, this figure is meaningless, as it doesn’t show the speed and scale of the demographic change that is taking place because of mass-migration.
The ONS has recorded the percentage of births in England & Wales to foreign-born mothers since 1969, though this data is split across multiple datasets and is not readily published on the ONS website.
Table 2a of the ‘Parents’ country of birth’ covers 2003 to 2024, and Table 1 of the ‘Births in England and Wales: summary tables’ covers 1969 to 2002.
The chart below shows the percentage of births in England & Wales to foreign-born mothers, from 1969 to 2024.
We can see that this figure has increased massively in recent years, coinciding with the record levels of immigration we’ve seen post-2021, dubbed the Boriswave.
From 1969 to 1997, the percentage of births to foreign-born mothers was relatively stable, hovering around the 11-13% mark. Then, after the election of Tony Blair in 1997 (who in his first year, increased net-migration into Britain from 48,000 to 140,000, an increase of 192%) the percentage of births to foreign-born mothers has increased exponentially.
In 2000, births to foreign-born mothers exceeded 15%, then they broke 20% in 2005, 25% in 2010 and crossed the 30% mark in 2022. Since the year 2000, births to foreign-born mothers have increased 118%
The ONS also collects data on the number of births in England & Wales to foreign-born fathers. This data only covers 2008 to 2024, but nonetheless shows similar trends. Table 2b of the ‘Parents’ country of birth’ covers 2008 to 2024.
The chart below shows the percentage of births in England & Wales to foreign-born fathers, from 2008 to 2024.
As you can observe, the percentage of births in England & Wales to foreign-born fathers closely mirrors that of foreign-born mothers. In 2008, 24.1% of births were to foreign-born fathers, by 2011, this figure was 25.2% and as with births to foreign-born mothers, births to foreign-born fathers broke the 30% mark in 2022 as well.
Since 2016, the ONS has collected data on the number of births to any foreign-born parent. This information is available in Table 6b or 7a (varies by release) of the same document and must be acquired individually from each document, the ONS does not summarise this figure over the years.
The chart below shows the percentage of births in England & Wales with at least one foreign-born parent, from 2016 to 2024.
Even with the more limited scope and the data only going back to 2016, we still see a substantial increase post 2021 and record number of births with a foreign-born parent, which stood at 39.5% of all births in England & Wales in 2024. For England, this figure is even higher, standing at 40.4%, meaning 4 in 10 births in England have at least one foreign born parent.
We also have data from the ONS on the percentage of births in England & Wales where both parents are foreign born, this data covers 1999, then 2003 to 2024.
Table 4 of the ‘Parents’ country of birth’ of the 2024 document covers 2008 to 2024, then Table 3a of the 2009 document details information for 1999 and 2003 to 2007.
The chart below shows the percentage of births in England & Wales with foreign-born mothers & fathers, from 1999 to 2024.
In 2024, 26.7% of births in England & Wales, over ¼ of all births, have parents who are both foreign born.
In 1999, this figure was just 8.6%, breaking 15% in 2007 and 20% in 2015.
Finally, we can look at the percentage of births in England & Wales to parents who were both born in the UK.
Table 4 of the ‘Parents’ country of birth’ of the 2024 document covers 2008 to 2024, then Table 3a of the 2009 document details information for 1999 and 2003 to 2007.
The chart below shows the percentage of births in England & Wales with UK-born mothers & fathers, from 1999 to 2024.
We can see that in 2024, just 57% of births in England & Wales were to mothers & fathers who were both born in the UK, which is even a substantial drop, even from 2021, where 62% of births had UK born parents and is a far-cry from the 1999 figure, where 73% of births in England & Wales had parents who were both born in the UK.
Massive demographic change is taking place in Britain.
Ok, so there’s now data on where parents to those born in the UK were born. But I don’t see how that data can lead one to conclude that ‘massive demographic change’ is underway in the UK or, indeed, that there’s change from past times. Why? Well, take my family as an example. My Scottish grandmother was born in NZ (c.1890) and her husband, my grandfather, equally Scottish, was born in Tibet (c.1885). My father, whose English parents met in France, was born in India in 1922 (which lead ChatGPT to reckon I’m Anglo-Indian). Why weren’t they born in the UK? Because of the globalisation of the day, aka the British Empire. In the dying days of the Empire, my parents met in Malta, and their children were born in the UK. Two of their four sons took advantage of modern-day globalisation and their (still British) children were born in France and Holland respectively, so of my parent’s nine grandchildren, five were born outside the UK. Two of the five live in the UK today. If you met any of us, you’d think us 100% British. I’m sure there are ten of thousands like us, some living in the UK today, some not. You probably have examples in your own family. Data on its own can’t tell the whole story.
Imagine how many more foreign births there will be if the child benefit cap is lifted ? Even more non working families straining the benefits system. ?