Population rockets in its biggest jump for 70 years

BRITAIN’S population shot up by more than half a million last year in its biggest leap for 70 years.

New estimates, published yesterday, said the UK population hit 65,648,000 last summer.

Nearly two-thirds of the 538,000 increase – the equivalent of adding a city larger than Edinburgh – was a result of immigration. Most incomers headed for London and elsewhere in the southern half of the UK, pushing the population of England alone above 55million for the first time.

The leap in population was counted by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) in the 12 months to the end of June last year – a period that coincided with the EU referendum campaign and the June 23 Brexit vote.

It comes just months after it was revealed Scotland’s population had hit a record high of more than 5.4million.

According to official figures published by the National Records of Scotland in April, the population had risen by 31,700 in a year, with a net migration gain from overseas helping to swell the population by 22,900.

Neil Park of the ONS said: ‘The population of the UK continued to grow in the year to mid-2016 at a similar rate to that seen over recent years.

‘Net international migration continued to be the main driver, but there was also an increase in births and fewer deaths than the previous year.

‘Population growth was not evenly distributed, with London’s growth rate more than twice that in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, and the three northern English regions.’

The only year in which a bigger leap has been recorded was 1947, when a post-war baby boom pushed up the population by 551,000.

‘Migration the main driver’