Migration fuels second largest population jump in England and Wales for more than 75 years
The population of England and Wales has grown by the second largest annual increase in more than 75 years, largely due to international migration.Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show the population grew by 700,000 in the year to June 2024, the second largest numerical jump since at least 1949, when comparable data began.The size of the increase is second only to the rise of 821,210 in the preceding 12 months from mid-2022 to mid-2023.The ONS found net international migration – the difference between people moving to the country and leaving – accounted for 690,147 of the estimated population increase of 706,881 people, or 98% of the total.It is estimated 1,142,303 people immigrated to England and Wales in the 12 months to June 2024, while 452,156 were likely to have emigrated.
Meanwhile, natural population change, which is the difference between births and deaths, accounted for only a small proportion of the increase.There were slightly more births (596,012) than deaths (566,030) in the year to mid-2024, which added 29,982 to the population.In total, there were an estimated 61.8 million people in England and Wales in mid-2024, up 1.2% from 61.
1 million in mid-2023.Internal migration to England and Wales from other parts of the UK was lower (42,693) than people moving from the two nations to elsewhere in the UK (56,300).Nigel Henretty, from the ONS, said the population of England and Wales had increased each year since mid-1982, but the rate of population increase had been higher in recent years.“Net international migration continues to be the main driver of this growth, continuing the long-term trend seen since the turn of the century,” he said.Earlier this year, the UK population exceeded that of France for the first time on record after it rose to 68.
3 million in mid-2023 – the population of France stood at 68,2 million,The ONS has predicted the UK population will grow to 73,7 million by mid-2036, hitting the 70 million mark a decade earlier than previously thought,Those projections assumed net migration would fall over the next few years from a peak of about 670,000 in the 12 months to June 2023, before settling at 315,000 from 2028 onwards.
In May, the government unveiled its plans to cut immigration, which included cuts to legal migration routes, stricter English requirements and tightening the rules for some work visas.Keir Starmer faced heavy criticism for saying the UK risked becoming an “island of strangers” as he announced the plans, later saying he “deeply regretted” using the language.The government has also expressed concern at the UK’s falling birthrate, which is at 1.44 children per woman, the lowest since records began in 1938 and below the figure of about 2.1 needed to maintain a population.
The education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, said she wanted “more young people to have children, if they choose”, saying the cost of living and housing was putting people off starting a family.
Stephen Colbert on Trump’s Scotland trip: ‘A grift for the whole family’
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The ‘Black Sundance’ honoring film-makers of color and focusing on community building
The voice of the writer Toni Cade Bambara overlays a montage of archival film and photographs of Black people at school and work in a new feature documentary about her life. “The Reconstruction era offers a window into the 1930s,” Bambara says in the film. “There is the same drive for land, for the vote, for labor rights, education. The same need for self-help enterprises, for group cooperation.”So begins TCB – The Toni Cade Bambara School of Organizing, the biographical film about the Black author, documentarian and social activist whose work on Black liberation and feminism helped inspire 20th-century social justice movements
Jon Stewart on Trump’s Epstein scandal: ‘How do you expect the media to move on, when Trump has such a hard time doing so?’
Late-night hosts followed Donald Trump and his Jeffrey Epstein scandal to Scotland, where he found new ways to put his foot in his mouth.Donald Trump headed to Scotland this week, nominally to work on a trade deal with the European Union, but also to put “an ocean’s distance between himself and the Epstein scandal”, said Jon Stewart on Monday’s Daily Show.But “how do you expect the media to move on, when Trump has such a hard time doing so?” he wondered.Stewart played a clip of a Scottish reporter asking Trump, “Mr President, was part of the rush to get this deal done to knock the Jeffrey Epstein story out?”“He’s all like, ‘How did you even hear about … I thought you guys just got Baywatch like three months ago?’” Stewart laughed. “‘Doesn’t anybody here have a question about this trade deal sinking both of our economies with tariffs?’”In response to the question, Trump offered what Stewart called his “13 Reasons Why I’m Not Involved with a Pedophile”
By the 30s, Katharine Hepburn was box office poison. Then she made The Philadelphia Story
As a stuck-up socialite tangled in a love triangle, Hepburn delivers one of the most memorable screwball heroines – and we can’t help but love herThese days, Katharine Hepburn is revered as a progressive icon of Hollywood’s golden age, an androgynous (and possibly queer) fashion rebel whose four best actress awards have yet to be topped at the Oscars. But back in 1938, only six years into her illustrious career, she was branded as “box office poison”.She was a star ahead of her time, her domineering screen presence registering as shrill and petulant by the tail end of the 1930s. After the box office disappointments of Bringing up Baby and Holiday – both now canonised romcom classics – she retreated from Hollywood and signed on to a new play penned by her friend Philip Barry: The Philadelphia Story.Like its film adaptation, Barry’s script centres on Tracy Lord, a stuck-up socialite (easily read as a stand-in for Hepburn herself) set to marry a wealthy politician, only for the wedding to be upended by the arrival of two competing romantic prospects: her ex-husband, CK Dexter Haven, and tabloid reporter Mike Connor
The joy of railways is shared by millions | Letters
Although a not a full-on Thomas the Tank Engine fan, I have for 65 years been an out-there and unashamed enthusiast for anything running on rails (‘Thomas the Tank Engine clung to me like a disease’: the film about the choo-choo’s global grownup superfans, 22 July).My wife and I sometimes do front-of-house at a heritage railway and can confirm the attraction of railways for those with autism, particularly young people. There is a predictability about railways, timetables, signals and all the other paraphernalia that is very attractive.Also, there is endless scope for studying minutiae and collecting odd bits of information. Numbers and names on the engines, liveries (colours of trains to you), performance records and endless other statistics
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An ethics record that this Labour government can be proud of | Letter
Labour pays estimated £2m to settle claims by 20 people over leaked antisemitism dossier