Number living in UK seen rising 4.9 million in decade from 2022
A view of migrants on the beach at sunrise after a failed attempt to cross the Channel to the UK on a small boat, in Sangatte, near Calais, France, on Aug 10, 2023. (Photo: Reuters)
LONDON —The United Kingdom’s (UK) population is set to hit 72.5 million by mid-2032, according to new official projections, an upward revision of more than 100,000 people that will pile pressure on Prime Minister Keir Starmer to crack down on immigration.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) thinks the population will increase by 4.9 million in the decade from mid-2022, or 7.3%, driven entirely by net migration as births and deaths roughly equalise.
It assumed that the number of people coming to the UK, minus those leaving, will settle at 340,000 per year from 2027 to 2028 onwards, up from previous estimates of 315,000. It comes after the ONS heavily revised up its estimates for UK net migration in the year to June 2023 to a record 906,000.
That is bigger than the population of most UK cities, and while net migration fell to 728,000 in the year to June 2024, it means the trend in the UK is still above where it was previously thought to be.
Starmer is under pressure to show that he is clamping down on immigration, amid worries that the high levels of people coming to the country are piling pressure on public services and housing. Protests around migration in the summer of 2024 escalated into far-right violence, with attacks made on hotels housing asylum seekers.
Keir Starmer, UK prime minister, during a television interview following a meeting with UK business executives at Bloomberg LP’s European headquarters in London on Tuesday. (Photo: Bloomberg)
The previous Conservative govern
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