Foreign-born residents increase

London: One in nine British residents was born overseas. Among the most common countries of birth were India (619,000 people), Poland (461,000), Ireland (416,000) and Pakistan (415,000). Christopher Hope and James Kirkup report.

One in nine people living in Britain was born overseas, according to figures that highlight significant changes in the population under the nation's Labour Government. Official statistics released Tuesday show that 6.5 million people born overseas were resident in Britain in the year to June 2008. This represented a rise of 290,000 on the previous year and an increase of 1.2 million since 2004.

In all, 10.7 per cent of the British population were born overseas. In 2001, the rate was around 8 per cent. Meanwhile, the number of British-born residents barely changed in four years. It was 53.9 million last year, compared with 53.8 million in 2004.

This was largely because of emigration: more than two million Britons have left the country since 1996. Tim Finch, the head of migration at the Institute for Public Policy Research, a think tank, said the new figures demonstrated the changing face of the UK after an era of more permissive immigration rules. "Britain looks different and has changed quite rapidly in recent years. Whether that's a problem depends on your attitude," he said.

Campaigners said the figures suggested that the British population was growing faster than previously forecast, with implications for future Government policies. Sir Andrew Green, of the pressure group Migrationwatch, said: "The remarkable increase in the foreign-born population suggests that our population may be growing even faster than the extra 10 million in the next 20 years that the government statisticians are already predicting".

The increase in foreign-born residents to nearly 11 per cent of the total population means the situation in Britain is closer to that in other major European countries. An estimated 12.5 per cent of the population of Germany was born abroad; in France the proportion is thought to be almost as high. There were also suggestions that the real level of immigration may be much higher.