HC Deb 13 June 1978 vol 951 cc808-9
2. Mr. Powell

asked the Secretary of State for Social Services what estimate he has made of the proportion which births to mothers born in the New Commonwealth and Pakistan bore to total births during the last 10 years in Birmingham, Bradford, Huddersfield, Leicester, Wolverhampton and the boroughs comprised in the Inner London education area.

Mr. Ennals

Information on births by birthplace of mother, which first became available in 1969, is published annually by the Registrar-General. As the answer involves a number of figures, I will, with permission, circulate a table in the Official Report.

Mr. Powell

Do not these proportions, already covering nearly 10 years, give a very good indication, at any rate as a minimum, of the eventual proportion of the total population in these areas which will be of New Commonwealth ethnic origin?

Mr. Ennals

What they show is something very different from what I think the right hon. Gentleman has been suggesting. He picked his own years and his own areas. The figures show an average figure for New Commonwealth and Pakistan births of 22 per cent., which is far less than the figure of 33 per cent. to which the right hon. Gentleman has frequently referred. He should not assume that fertility rates in these ethnic communities will continue at a high level, nor that there will not be a movement of minority groups from one city to another, as is already happening. I point out to him that in many of the areas which he specified the proportion of births to New Commonwealth and Pakistan mothers went down during the period concerned. That includes the constituency that the right hon. Gentleman originally represented.

Mr. Flannery

Will my right hon. Friend accept from me that the obsession which the right hon. Member for Down, South (Mr. Powell) has about the births of coloured people is not shared by human beings in general throughout the entire universe, and that women will go on having babies as long as there are men with them? Is it not about time that we thought about improving the lot of all human beings instead of being obsessed with this particular aspect, as the right hon. Gentleman is?

Mr. Ennals

I agree with much that my hon. Friend said. It has, I believe,

BIRTHS TO MOTHERS BORN IN THE NEW COMMONWEALTH AND PAKISTAN AS A PERCENTAGE OF ALL BIRTHS FOR SELECTED AREAS*. 1969 TO 1976
Area of usual residence of mother 1969† 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976
Birmingham 19 20 20 20 22 22 23 24
Bradford 17 17 17 18 18 19 19 21
Kirklees 15 15 15 15 14 15 17 18
Leicester 18 19 20 23 25 26 28 30
Wolverhampton 26 25 24 25 25 24 27 25
Inner London Education Authority: Total 22 22 22 22 22 22 23 24
Camden 16 17 15 14 16 15 15 17
Greenwich 9 9 9 9 10 11 12 12
Hackney 32 32 30 34 32 33 34 35
Hammersmith 22 23 21 21 21 21 20 21
Islington 28 28 29 26 26 25 26 25
Kensinston and Chelsea 14 13 12 10 12 12 12 12
Lambeth 32 31 30 30 29 30 29 30
Lewisham 20 19 20 19 18 20 20 19
Southwark 18 18 19 20 20 20 21 21
Tower Hamlets 17 17 18 21 25 27 27 31
Wandsworth 27 27 27 28 26 26 29 29
City of Westminster and City of London 16 16 15 15 15 16 15 18
Total of above areas 21 21 20 21 21 22 23 23
* As constituted at 1st April 1974.
† April 1969 to March 1970.