Census throws up surprises for city

TOWNSVILLE remains the largest city north of the Tropic of Capricorn in Australia with a population of 192,768 recorded in the 2021 Census, economist Colin Dwyer says.

Mr Dwyer said this was about 2.7 per cent lower than the estimated resident population figure released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in April this year.

The Adjunct Professor at James Cook University was commenting on population data released by the ABS on Tuesday as part of the 2021 Census conducted on August 10 last year. Mr Dwyer said the demographic profile of Northern Australia’s largest city showed there were slightly more females than males living in Townsville but that there were proportion ally more males than the national average. He said almost 9 per cent of residents were Indigenous, which was almost triple the national average.

The median or middle age in the Townsville local government area was 36, lower than the national average.

“Proportionally, there are more younger people in Townsville than the national profile, with fewer older residents also revealing a different result to the national picture,” he said. “This is because of a strong military presence, tertiary education students and health workforce.”

Mr Dwyer said the Census data showed Townsville was a divorce hotspot. “Fewer people are married compared to the national average and, proportionally more people are divorced in Townsville,” he said. “Proportionally, more people live in de facto relationships than the national average.”

On ancestry, he said there were more people with English, Irish and Scottish heritage than average and fewer people than average with Indian and Chinese heritage.

He questioned whether Townsville was gaining “our fair share” of international migrants and whether the city was missing out on crucial skills and cultural diversity that migrants provided.