UK Tops Diaspora Destination

The Indian Diaspora in the UK

According to the latest census conducted in the UK, the largest ethnic group currently residing in the UK is the Indian community. With this, Hinduism is the third most popular religion in the country, with nearly 1.5 percent of the total population in the country coming from the Indian subcontinent.

The basis of these conclusions was the 2011 census numbers. Other facts discovered in the study revealed a three million head increase in the past decade of immigrant populations in England and Wales. The current number now stands at 7.5 million individuals. The most common birthplaces of immigrants were India, Poland and Pakistan respectively.

The numbers also showed that only 3.7 million Londoners had described their ethnicity as ‘White British’. This was a decrease from 4.3 million in 2001 who indicated the same ethnicity. This number represented only 44.9 percent of London’s total population. It was also found that in 2011, only 7.5 million of the population was foreign born, which is thirteen percent of the overall population. In real terms, one in every eight individuals in the country were foreign born. In 2001, there were only 4.6 million.

This is believed to be the first instance in history that British White population has become a minority in any region in the UK. Overall, the number of ethnic White British individuals is said to have dropped by as much as eighty percent.

The survey also found that only 33.2 million indicated their religion as Christian, a decrease from 2001 numbers showing 37.3 million individuals subscribing to the same religion. This new number is just fifty nine percent of the total population. About twenty five percent indicated they have no faith, which is an increase from 14.8 percent a decade earlier. People professing the Islamic faith also increased from 3.0 percent to 4.8 percent.

This increase makes Islam the fastest growing religion in the country. The third most popular religion found was Hinduism, with 1.5 percent and Sikhism, at 0.8 percent. 0.5 percent also professed allegiance to the Jewish faith.

The total population of England and Wales reached 56.1 million, which is an overall increase of seven percent from 2001 numbers and fifty five percent of this increase has been attributed to migration.

Tagged as: diaspora, England, population, religion, survey, United Kingdom, Wales