England and Wales population hits record as over-65s overtake under-15s

The population of England and Wales aged 65 and over has finally surpassed the number of children aged under 15, according to the first results of the 2021 census, which provided a snapshot of an increasingly crowded island nation.

As a 20% surge in the number of people aged 65 and over in the past decade drove the population of England and Wales to a historic high of 59,597,300, the Office for National Statistics recorded 11.1 million people aged 65 and over compared with 10.4 million people aged under 15, tipping a balance that has favoured the young for decades.

Related: England and Wales in numbers: key points from the 2021 census

The figures also showed the places dominated by large minorities of the young and old with Barking and Dagenham reporting the largest proportion of people aged under 20 at 31.5%, while Richmondshire in North Yorkshire had the biggest increase in the proportion of 65 and overs, rising from 17.5% of the population in 2011 to 23.5% in 2021. One in three people in North Norfolk is now 65 or over.

The number of infants aged four and under was one of the few categories where the population fell but the over-90 population broke through the half a million mark, rising to 527,900 people.

The count was based on questionnaires filled out by households on Sunday 21 March 2021 and is an 6.3% increase on the 2011 figure of 56,075,912 – an extra 3.5 million people.

It means the wider UK population is almost 67 million, once census results published last month for Northern Ireland, showing a population of 1.9 million, and the latest estimate for Scotland, of 5.47 million, are added. The total is on course to break the 70 million mark in the next five years, but population growth in England and Wales has decreased slightly over the last decade. The census results come against the backdrop of Brexit – which restricted immigration – and the coronavirus pandemic, which increased mortality in 2020 and 2021.

There are 11.1 million more people living in England and Wales than there were in 1981 (48.5 million) and with 434 residents for each square kilometre, England now ranks as the second-most densely populated country in Europe after the Netherlands (507 persons per sq km), based on figures from Eurostat.

Tower Hamlets is the most densely populated place, with 15,695 people per square kilometre, while the hills of Eden, which cover parts of the Lake District, Pennines and Yorkshire Dales, and Powys in Wales were the least densely populated, with 26 usual residents per square kilometre.

The last UK population estimate made by the Office for National Statistics was 67.1 million in mid-2020. There are 1.4m more households than in 2011.

The snapshot of the England and Wales population was unveiled at St Alban’s CE primary school in Havant after pupils won a competition involving “counting things”.

The overall figures mean the UK remains the third largest country in Europe behind Germany, which had 83.2 million people on 1 January 2021, and France, which at the same date had 67.7 million people, according to Eurostat.

In 2011, 9.2 million residents of England and Wales were 65 and over, an increase of almost 1 million from 2001, when the figure was 8.3 million. By 2021 it had risen again to 11.1 million, more than one-sixth of the total.

The census data is instrumental in national and local government decision-making on the distribution of funds for health and education, guiding locations and targets for housebuilding and projecting future social care needs.

It is the 22nd full census in Great Britain; the first was in 1801. The undertaking has happened every 10 years apart from during the second world war. Statisticians consider 1841 the first modern census, when the head of each household was given a form to fill in on behalf of everyone in the household on a certain day.

This may be the last census of its kind. The ONS has previously said it is looking at cheaper ways of gathering population-wide data, combining administrative data such as GP, tax and driving licence records with regular population surveys. The government has stated that its “ambition is that censuses after 2021 will be conducted using other sources of data and providing more timely statistical information”.

The ONS’s deputy national statistician, Pete Benton, stressed the need for more up-to-date methods of assessing the population, pointing out that the figures were already out of date.

“People continue to move home, some people will have left the country, others will have arrived,” he said. “People will have changed jobs, some of us now work in offices once again, while others continue to work from home.”

He said the plan was for “more frequent, relevant and timely statistics using data from across government to allow us to understand population change”.

More detailed figures illustrating changes in the ethnicity, sexual orientation and gender identity, religion, language and education of the people of England and Wales will be released in the autumn. Data on health, housing, unpaid care, disability, work and the UK’s armed forces veterans will also be published later this year.