An illegitimate argument
11:25am
Today’s headlines about how one in five kids is born to a foreign mother overlooks a rather interesting fact. In London, it’s one in two. And these newcomers conform better than natives to what we like to call “traditional” British values – in that far more of them are born inside marriage. When researching my political column for tomorrow’s treble issue (our biggest ever, don’t miss it) I found that if you stripped out immigrants then 2007 will prove to be the first year in recorded British history that most kids would be born outside marriage. So this year we have passed a true social landmark: what we used to call “illegitimacy” has this year become the norm (for British-born people, anyway). And only mass immigration conceals this trend.
Live births in UK within marriage (as %) by country of birth of mother. Source: ONS.
All UK New Far Pakistan
in UK Born Ireland Cwlth East
2002 59.4 54.6 69.5 86.9 84.8 98.4
2003 58.6 53.6 67.4 85.8 86.2 98.2
2004 57.8 52.5 67.9 85.4 88.3 97.9
2005 57.2 51.5 66.2 84.8 85.5 98.0
2006 56.5 50.6 67.7 84.8 85.2 97.9
2007* 55.8 49.6 66.4 84.3 86.6 97.8
* 2007 data is a projection, from five-year trend
Previous
Comments
mitch
December 12th, 2007 11:55amDoes the treble issue mean nothing on the 21st as well as the 28th?
Tiberius
December 12th, 2007 12:23pmI suppose you would have to say that the parents of the 50.4% of kids place greater faith in the socialist Utopian state than the book of Revelation. You would also have to assume that if our obscene abortion rate were to fall, even fewer live births would take place within marriage.
William
December 12th, 2007 12:23pmAnd if the children grow up to be suicide bombers, at least you can cite that they adopted 'traditional British values' in birth even if they didn't carry them through life. Quite an astonishing post. British people should accept an unprecedented level of immigration on the grounds that some foreign folk are married and some British people aren't. We'll be getting the 'and they work harder than us' line in a minute. When did you start having utter contempt for the British people?
Cinnamon
December 12th, 2007 3:12pmAnyone who marries and has kids is crazy. The woman is far better off on her own once she has kids, 16 hours work p/t and then claim a tax credit top up equiv of £30k b4 tax -- life has never been easier, no man, no cry. Why would she get married? And why should men bother -- when there is nothing in it for them other than hard graft and instant poverty upon divorce? If anything is amazing that anyone is still married.
Cinnamon
December 12th, 2007 3:12pmAnyone who marries and has kids is crazy. The woman is far better off on her own once she has kids, 16 hours work p/t and then claim a tax credit top up equiv of £30k b4 tax -- life has never been easier, no man, no cry. Why would she get married? And why should men bother -- when there is nothing in it for them other than hard graft and instant poverty upon divorce? If anything it's amazing that anyone is still married.
Anan
December 12th, 2007 3:19pmWilliam: It's Fraser Nelson who made this post - he's biased.
Fraser Nelson
December 12th, 2007 4:44pmWilliam/Anan, I'm not with you... I'm simply pointing out that this is a landmark year, the first time in probably more than a millennium of history that most kids would be born outside marriage. You can say this is good/bad/neutral but to my mind this is rather significant. Are you suggesting we shouldn't be pointing this out? My second point is that the wave of immigration disguises such trends.
Stan
December 12th, 2007 9:28pmAnan, why is Fraser Nelson biased?
de Plume
December 13th, 2007 10:56amThis is a great bit of digging by Mr Nelson - if he is reading this, he should give himself a pat on the back. I look forward to reading the column. It's another illustration of how, on average, immigrants stick to traditional family values much more than other Britons. Also interesting to note that Polish women in England have a much higher birth rate than Polish women of similar age in Poland.