Census shows women outnumber men as population in England and Wales surges to high of 59.6m

A record 59.6million people are living in England and Wales, the new census has shown.

The population grew by 3.5million in a decade, with the East of England seeing the biggest growth, the Office for National Statistics revealed yesterday.

Women now outnumber men in almost every part of the country, with just 13 council areas left where there are more males than females. What’s more, there are more older people than ever, with one in six now over 65 and a huge rise in the over-90s.

The data also reveal stark differences in how crowded areas are. London’s population density is a staggering 37 times the average in Wales, with all 20 of the most crowded areas in the capital. Tower Hamlets had 15,695 residents per square kilometre, while Eden in Cumbria had just 26.

The first estimates from the census taken on March 21 last year show the ‘usual resident population’ of England was 56,489,800 and 3,107,500 in Wales.

The population grew by 3.5million in a decade, with the East of England seeing the biggest growth, the Office for National Statistics revealed yesterday

Scotland’s census was only taken this year, while Northern Ireland’s recent results show around 1,903,100 people. The total UK population, taking in the latest estimate of the Scottish population at 5,470,000, is likely to now be approaching 67 million.

The population of England and Wales grew by 6.6 per cent since the last census in 2011 – although the rate of growth has ‘decreased slightly’, having grown by 7.8 per cent between 2001 and 2011 as millions from Eastern Europe took advantage of EU membership to move to the UK.

Eastern England saw the biggest increase (8.3 per cent), while the North East grew by just 1.9 per cent and Wales 1.4. Although most areas gained residents since 2011, with Tower Hamlets in east London growing by 22.1 per cent, some places saw an exodus, with 9.6 per cent fewer people living in Kensington and Chelsea, west London.

Women made up 51 per cent of the population and men 49 – similar to a decade ago. But while in 2011 there were 26 local authority areas where men outnumbered women, now there are just 13 such places, with the lowest proportion of women in the City of London (44.2 per cent).

Men also outnumber women in Rutland (51.5 per cent) and Richmondshire (51.1 per cent). The areas with the largest proportion of women are all in London, headed by Kensington and Chelsea (53.5 per cent), Hammersmith (53.1 per cent) and Camden (52.6 per cent).

The ONS revealed that the population is continuing to age. There are now 11.1million over-65s, up from 9.2million in 2011 and making up 18.6 per cent of the total, while the number over 90 has risen by 23 per cent from 429,017 to 527,900. The biggest concentrations of the elderly were found in North Norfolk (33.4 per cent over 65) and Rother in East Sussex (32 per cent), while in East Devon 1.9 per cent were over 90.

There were 3.2million children under four, down 7.6 per cent from 3.5million in 2011. James Kirkup, of the Social Market Foundation think-tank, said: ‘Britain is running out of babies.’ He predicted the falling birth rate – possibly caused by a lack of houses and costly childcare – would close schools and push up immigration to fill job vacancies.

Overall, there are 395 residents per square kilometre – up from 371 a decade ago and 251 a century back – around 2.8 people per football-pitch-sized area.