growing painspopulation and sustainability in the UK

Forum for the Future team:Peter MaddenJames GoodmanJoy GreenClare Jenkinson

For more information please contact:info@forumforthefuture.org

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Date of publication:June 2010

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Forum for the Future, the sustainable development NGO, works in partnership with leading businesses and public service providers, helping them devise more sustainable strategies and deliver new products and services which enhance people’s lives and are better for the environment. www.forumforthefuture.org

Discussion panelA number of people kindly gave their time to talk the issues through with us. They are not responsible for the views in the document.

Ben Plowden Transport for LondonDamian Green Conservative Party Dr William Bird Intelligent HealthHannah Bartram Environment AgencyHugh Raven Sustainable Development CommissionIan Ducat UNISON South WestJean Candler British Institute of Human RightsJill Mortimer Local Government AssociationJim Longhurst University of the West of EnglandKate Gordon Campaign to Protect Rural EnglandKirsty MacLachlan General Register Office for ScotlandLeslie Watson Sustainability South WestPaul Monaghan The Co-operative GroupPaul Rainger Forum for the FuturePeter Singleton Scottish Environment Protection Agency Richard Blakeway Greater London AuthorityRon Hewitt Edinburgh Chamber of CommerceRosamund McDougall Optimum Population TrustSandy Halliday Gaia researchSara Parkin Forum for the FutureSarah Mulley Institute for Public Policy Research Stuart Housden RSPB ScotlandSusan Deacon Queen Margaret UniversityYolanda Rizzi Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution

Final thoughts — 17

The seven broad implications for policy-makers that we have distilled from our enquiry are not a solution to the challenges of population growth, but they do set out where thought and action is needed. We need first to bring debate about the population of the UK and the world into the mainstream, and recognise that it is a sustainability issue. Understanding it in this way will allow us to approach it in a more integrated, long-term and balanced manner, to avoid knee-jerk responses and laissez-faire attitudes, and engage in a sensible debate about how to create a sustainable future for all people, near and far.

5.final thoughts

The answer to Sir David Attenborough’s question ‘How many people can live on Earth?’ is: “it depends”. The sustainability dynamic in the relationship between different elements of the I=PxAxT equation (see page 3) means that we can intervene in all sorts of ways to avoid worst-case scenarios. In this paper we have tried to address the P element in a way that makes it easier to understand the contribution that holding down the numbers of people in the UK could make to sustainable development.

The key message that we heard throughout this project is that it is feasible to hit the lower projections, both here in the UK and worldwide, and that achieving the lower projections will be relatively simple compared to the challenge of coping with the higher projections. Achieving that, and getting onto the lower projection trajectories that would follow, will ease other pressures enormously.

contents

Foreword 2Executivesummary 31. Introduction 4—51.1 UKpopulationisprojectedtogrowrapidly2. Whatarethepotentialsustainabilityimpacts 6—9 ofthisgrowthfortheUK?2.1 Naturalenvironment2.2 Socialandeconomicwellbeing2.3 Infrastructure2.4 Conclusion3. Isitsensibleordesirabletointervene 10—13 inUKpopulationgrowth?3.1 Efficiency3.2 Affluence3.3 Numbersofpeople3.4 Long-termresilience3.5 Conclusion4. Conclusions:improvingthewaywe 14—16 addresspopulation 4.1 Planforwhat’scoming4.2 Usewhatwehavemoreefficiently4.3 Rethink‘growth’4.4 Newattitudestoageing4.5 Enhancefamilyplanning4.6 Abalanceddiscussiononimmigration4.7 Haveanopenandsensibledebate5. Finalthoughts 17

2 — Foreword

foreword

The maths of sustainability is simple – the equation requires fewer people consuming less – yet we find it difficult to talk about either. Sex is used to promote consumption, selling everything from motorcars to magazines, but there is no ‘health warning’ about the possible consequences to the individuals involved or the planet of irresponsible procreation. Nor dare we admit to ourselves that greater efficiency in our use of resources will not be enough on its own; any savings we have made in energy use, for example, have been quickly wiped out by growth in overall consumption. Our human economy is, indeed, structured on the premise of growth based on more people consuming more, a diametrically opposed logic to the economy of the earth which needs us to do the opposite.

As the new parliament begins its work, this paper is designed to make it easier for decision-makers throughout the UK to address population as an essential factor in the sustainability equation. The context is the Office of National Statistics’ projection that UK population is set to increase by 10 million by 2033 – the equivalent of adding one Bristol or two Newcastles every year. We have talked to people around the country and brought forward some of the latest thinking in

order to bust a few population myths and to promote sensible conversations about different choices we face. For example, the fact that over a third of all pregnancies are unplanned – a proportion similar to that of Africa – immediately suggests policies which could prevent economic and environmental costs, as well as personal pain.

Our purpose is to help decision-makers think ahead and plan for the best, rather than be caught unprepared by the worst.

We would be happy to hear your reflections on this paper and to discuss any of the issues it raises with you.

Sara Parkin OBE, Founder Director, Forum for the Future

Theeconomydominatedthe2010UKelection,butsustainabilityandpopulationbarelygotamention,eitherintheleaderdebatesorthepartymanifestoes.Nevertheless,bothshouldloomverylargeonthenewgovernment’spolicyagenda.AsadvisorstoBarackObamahavepointedout,thefutureforeveryonewillbedominatedbyscarcity–ofresources,ofland,ofairspace(forCO2emissions).Noeconomicrecoverypackagewillsucceedunlessitrecognisestheselimitsandseekstoofferlifesatisfactionandopportunitytoallpeoplewithinthem.Themorepeopletherearetheharderthatwillbe.

We found no argument that doing all of this would be anything but difficult. But we were able to distil from our research and our discussions seven suggestions on how to start this shift. They are: 1) Plan for what’s coming All major public infrastructure bodies and service providers should carry out detailed planning for the impacts of continued population growth. 2) Use what we have more efficiently Many of the things we need to do to live more sustainably in the UK, such as using energy and water more efficiently, also help us to accommodate rising numbers of people. 3) Rethink ‘growth’ We need to urgently develop new ways of evaluating the success of our economy that point towards increasing human wellbeing and quality of life. 4) Develop new attitudes to ageing We should value the contribution that older people can make to society, and adopt a more flexible approach to family, work and education throughout people’s lives. 5) Enhance family planningWe can improve targeted education and make contraception more easily available in the UK and globally. 6) Hold an objective discussion on immigration We need to understand the value immigration makes to the UK economy at the same time as seeing it in a global context. 7) Have an open and sensible debate We need policy-makers to address population head-on, not ignore it because it is too controversial.

Executive summary — 3

The UK population is projected to grow at its fastest rate since the post-war ‘baby boom’, increasing from 61.4 million now to 70.6 million in 2030. According to the projections, growth will be driven in part through natural change – more people being born than dying – and also through net inward migration – more people arriving in the UK than leaving. The growth will be uneven across the country, with faster rates in central and southern England and slower rates in northern England and Scotland. This makes the UK part of the coming global increase in population, albeit at a lower rate of growth: in the time it takes the UK to increase in population by 16%, countries in sub-Saharan Africa will grow by over 50%.

GrowthintheUKpopulationwillhavewide-rangingimpacts There are both costs and benefits. A further 9 million people by 2030 will increase pressures on public services, infrastructure and the natural environment, requiring thorough long-term planning. The pressure will be worse in certain areas, depending on where people choose to live.

On the other hand, population growth increases the number of economically active people and can help the UK continue to be a vibrant, multicultural society. Ultimately however, it is impossible to see how population growth – globally or in the UK – can continue forever. Social and economic models that rely on this cycle are doomed to fail eventually and so at some point, we will have to come up with alternative models.

In this paper, we don’t go so far as to suggest what that alternative model is, but from our exploration of the topic it became clear that there were several benefits to considering population growth through the prism of sustainability. We try to show the points of leverage for a sustainable approach to population. Using the I=PxAxT equation first developed by Paul Ehrlich and John Holdren – in which impact ‘I’ is a factor of population ‘P’, affluence ‘A’ and technology ‘T’ – we show that efficiency of systems must be increased through deployment of new technologies and better, more integrated planning; consumption must be reduced by focusing on wellbeing and quality of life; and population growth can be constrained, primarily through more effective family planning.

executive summary

Populationasadiscussiontopicisoff-limitsformostUKpoliticians,inawaythatplaysintothehandsofilliberalandxenophobicorganisations.Butitshouldbepossibletohaveanintelligentandsensitivedebateaboutoneofthemostimportantissuesofourtime.Thispaper,theresultofresearchandmanyconversations,isourattempttostimulatesuchadebateaboutpopulationintheUKandbeyond,andtopresenttheissueofpopulationgrowthasessentiallylinkedtothegoalofsustainabledevelopment.

What are we to make of these projections? What do they mean for a country – and a world – aiming to achieve sustainability? How do we talk about and act on population concerns in a responsible way? And how can we engage constructively in discussions about population dynamics?

Behind the top-line figures for world and UK population, lie millions of intimate human stories. Our numbers and the decisions we take about having children, or about how and where we live, are at the heart of designing a more sustainable way of life.

This paper is designed to help Forum’s partners, policy-makers in all sectors, and other interested parties address questions such as these. It is the result of research, three workshops we held in London, Edinburgh and Bristol (with representatives from government agencies, academia, business and voluntary sector organisations), and an application of our knowledge about the ins and outs of population and where it fits into the sustainability equation. It is primarily about population in the UK, whilst always remaining mindful of the global context.

Given the nature of today’s population and sustainability challenges, debate about how to manage any growth in the UK population is worryingly absent. Far from engaging in serious discussions about population growth, we seem stuck on the question of whether we should even be having those discussions or not. Few politicians want to tackle the debate, preferring to take a laissez-faire approach.

Add to this distortions by a not very well-informed media, and too often, debate about population is left to the mercies of the far right ideologies.

Should population management become an explicit government policy, or should it continue to be laissez-faire and linked primarily to the perceived needs of the economy?Participant — Bristol roundtable

In this paper, we endeavour to take a positive and constructive approach to discussing population. We want to improve the quality of debate about population growth and bring it to centre-stage in discussions about sustainability.

In that spirit, we should be clear about our starting point. We do not believe that the higher projections for future population levels in the UK are inherently unsustainable. We could, in theory, find hyper-efficient ways to process resources or, alternatively, get everybody to accept what they perceive to be a lower standard of living. But we do think that the additional numbers, as well as the projected rate of growth, will make the achievement of sustainability that much harder.

However, the higher projections for growth are not inevitable. With good leadership, we can intervene to ensure that population growth is effectively and sensitively minimised and managed to ensure we achieve the lower projections.

1. introduction

AccordingtotheOfficeofNationalStatistics:“Overthenext25years,theUKpopulationisprojectedtorisefromanestimated61.4millionin2008to71.6millionby2033.ItisprojectedthatthepopulationoftheUKwillexceed70millionby2029.”1

Source: Current UK population from ONS mid 2008 estimates and UK projections from ONS 2008-based National Population Projections world population estimate and projections from UN Population Division World Population Prospects 2008 revision http://esa.un.org/unpp/index.asp (Rounded figures)

1 ONS, National Population Projections, 20092 The actual figure is 61,383,000 Source: ONS latest population estimates, August 2009 3 National Statistician’s annual article on the population, Population Trends No 134 Winter 2008

4 — Introduction

The words ‘population growth’ are perhaps more likely to conjure images of burgeoning developing-world megacities than crowded English counties. Many people assume that high levels of population growth in the UK – and the associated social impacts – belong to the industrial revolution and are all in the past.

This is not the case. The UK population stood at around 61 million in 2008.2 This represents an increase of more than two million since mid-2001, the fastest UK population growth since the 1960s.3 This growth has been driven by a combination of two main factors: ‘natural increase’ (the changing balance between births and deaths) and an increase in net migration into the UK (more people coming in than leaving).1.1UKpopulationisprojectedtogrowrapidly

UK (million)

2008 2030 2050

Estimate Projections

Low 66.8 67.3

61.4 Principle 70.6 77.1

High 74.4 87.3

World (billion)

2009 2030 2050

Estimate Projections

Low 7.9 8.0

6.8 Median 8.3 9.1

High 8.8 10.5

Introduction — 5

The natural increase is due both to a rise in fertility rates – women are having more children4 – and increasing life expectancy. In 2008, for example, there were 708,708 live births in the UK, and 509,090 registered deaths,5 leading to a net increase of around 200,000. And life expectancy is going up at a rate of about 2 years a decade.6

A lot of the increase in fertility rates is indirectly due to migration, mainly because a disproportionate number of migrant women are of child-bearing age. In addition, UK-based women not born in the UK tend to have larger families than women born in the UK.7

The rate of immigration into the UK has almost doubled since 1997, and has outpaced an increase in emigration, leading to a significant net population gain. Migration has been at high levels8 in recent years, partly resulting from the expansion of the European Union,9 though this trend has slowed recently, in part due to the recession and the collapse in the value of the pound. It is not clear whether it will be maintained.10 Refugees and asylum seekers make up a very small proportion of the total inflow of migrants. In 2008, the number of asylum applications (excluding dependants) was 26,000 compared to the total 590,000 people who arrived to live in the UK.11

It is estimated that there are between 373,000 and 719,000 irregular12 migrants living in the UK,13 although by its very nature this figure is difficult to estimate. These latter figures are not included in the ONS projections, yet obviously these numbers represent a material contribution to the UK population.

An extra 9 million people by 2030?

Population projections are extrapolations that indicate what will happen if existing trends in fertility, mortality and net migration continue unchanged. Although they are based on rigorous research and survey work and are validated by an expert advisory group, they are not predictions and do not try to take into account future events or policy changes.14

The principal 2008-based projection indicates, on current known trends, a significant potential rise in the UK’s population: an extra 9 million people by 2030. Around half of this growth would be due to migration and half to natural

increase. However, future numbers of births and deaths are themselves partly dependent on future migration. Taking this into account, just over two-thirds of the projected total increase in the UK population between 2008 and 2030 is expected to be either directly or indirectly due to future migration.15

Most population growth is projected to occur in England. Every English region except the Northeast may have to accommodate a double-digit percentage increase in population over the 24-year period from 2007 to 2031.16 This is an especially acute issue for London and the South East due to the already high levels of population density.

The projections for 2030 would represent the fastest population growth since the post-war baby boom began more than 50 years ago. It works out to growth of around 0.7% per annum.

At the same time, the global population is projected to increase from 6.8 billion in 2009 to just over 8.3 billion by 2030, according to the UN.17 In percentage terms, this is much faster than UK growth, at over 1% per annum. Growth will be concentrated in the world’s poorest countries: the population of sub-Saharan Africa looks set to increase by 51% in the same period, a rate of 2.6% per annum, or almost four times as high as UK growth.

Globally, around 5 billion people will live in urban environments – an increase of 2 billion from today – whereas the rural population will stay broadly similar to today at around 3 billion.18 World food production will have to increase by 50% to meet rising demand.19 World water demands are projected to increase by 30%20 and global energy demands by 50%21 over the same period. This global population growth sets an important context for whatever happens in the UK.

4 From a low of 1.63 children per woman in 2001 to 1.96 in 2008 Source: National Statistics, ‘Rise in UK Fertility continues’, August 2009, http://www.statistics.gov.uk/cci/nugget.asp?id=951 5 Office for National Statistics, Statistical Bulletin, Births and Deaths in England and Wales, 2008 http://www.statistics.gov.uk/pdfdir/bdths0509.pdf 6 BBC news, ‘A long and unhappy retirement?’, 1998 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/51348.stm 7 In 2007, the estimated total fertility rate for women not born in the UK was 2.54, but only 1.79 for UK born women Source: National Statistician’s annual article on the population, Population Trends No 134 Winter 20088 Government Actuarial Department9 Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia 10 More than 3 million immigrants to the UK in the last thirty years have subsequently left – around half the total. The size of the exodus is increasing, with more than 190,000 leaving in 2007 – a number that is likely to be exceeded in 2008, IPPR, New research shows that exodus of immigrants from UK is speeding up, 2009 http://www.ippr.org.uk/pressreleases/?id=3664 11 Office for National Statistics, Migration Statistics 2008 Annual Report12 The UN Convention on the Rights of Migrants defines a migrant worker as a “person who is to be engaged, is engaged or has been engaged in a remunerated activity in a state of which he or she is not a national.” Irregular migrants (or undocumented / illegal migrants) are those people who enter a country, usually in search of employment, without the necessary documents and permits; UNESCO, Migration > Glossary > Migrant, 2009, http://portal.unesco.org/shs/en/ev.php-URL_ID=3020&URL_ DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html 13 LSE, Economic impact on the London and UK economy of an earned regularisation of irregular migrants to the UK, 200914 ONS, National Population Projections, 2006 based15 ONS Press release, ‘UK population projected to grow by 4 million over the next decade’, 21 October 2009, http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/Product.asp?vlnk=8519 16 Using 2006-based Subnational Population Projections. National Statistician’s annual article on the population, Population Trends No 134 Winter 2008 17 Medium variant projection, UN, World population prospects (2008 revision)18 UN, World urbanization prospects (2008 revision)19 Professor John Beddinton, Presentation at Sustainable Development UK, 2009 20 Professor John Beddinton, Presentation at Sustainable Development UK, 2009 21 Professor John Beddinton, Presentation at Sustainable Development UK, 2009

2.1Naturalenvironment

Firstly, the impact of population growth on our food, water, environment and other stocks of natural capital, which underpin the entire economy is huge.

The UK overall is a densely populated country, though large and less populated areas persist in northern England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. While in some respects our natural environment is well maintained, we are also putting increasing pressure on our land and water, increasing the amount of pollution and waste, and emitting too much CO2. And of course, in the UK the greatest population growth is expected in the areas that already have greatest pressure of numbers.

Growth is more manageable if we have better regional distribution. If the South East takes the brunt, that is clearly unsustainable and a major problem.Participant — Bristol roundtable

Population increases could lead to greater competition for land – be it for housing, agriculture, food, leisure or conservation and almost inevitably to a further concreting over of green space and greenfield land.

The building of new housing and associated transport infrastructure on previously undeveloped land, both in rural and urban areas, is perhaps the most visible impact of population growth on the natural environment. The impact on ecosystems will depend on how well new infrastructure is designed and built –- for example, whether it minimises or intensifies the effects of rainwater run-off and soil erosion; whether it provides sufficient habitat for native species; and how the design of new infrastructure affects individual behaviour, especially with regard to energy use, water use and transport choices.

There is already huge pressure to release land from Green Belts to accommodate new housing development. A recent report by the Social Market Foundation concluded that “if the UK is to meet the Government’s housing target of

2.what are the potential sustainability impacts of this growth for the UK?

TheprojectedUKpopulationgrowthwillhavebothpositiveandnegativeimpacts.Ourresearchandstakeholderworkshopsexaminedconcernsaboutthepotentialimpactsinthreemainareas:thenaturalenvironment,economicandsocialwellbeingandinfrastructureandservices.Wecanreviewtheevidencebytakingeachoftheseinturn.

6 — What are the potential sustainability impacts of this growth for the UK?

What are the potential sustainability impacts of this growth for the UK? — 7

3 million new homes by 2020, it will have to build 1.8 million new houses on greenfield sites or the Green Belt”.22 In another report for the Treasury, a review of Green Belt development was called for.23 Although current policy is to target development on brownfield sites, pressure on Green Belt land is bound to increase. London’s Green Belt boundaries are being reviewed in 18 separate locations with a view to accommodating new housing development. In Nottingham, government inspectors have recommended wholesale removal of the Green Belt designations on three out of four sides of the city.24

The demand for housing will also increase the pressure to build on flood plains and areas vulnerable to flood risk. Currently, around 5.2 million properties in England, the equivalent to one in six properties, are at risk of flooding.25 With climate change and further development pressures, flood risk in England is going to increase in the future, with potentially the most significant change to be experienced in the second half of this century.26

Projected population growth could also affect the UK’s food security, about which there have been rising concerns in recent years. As the National Farmers Union has observed, “Until 2007, few would have believed that food security was anything but an issue for the poorest, least-developed countries in the world.”27 However, in 2008 wheat prices hit £180 a tonne and oil rocketed to $147 a barrel. Food security is both a domestic and a global issue, but globalization means the UK consumer is locked into the global food system. Food security in the UK is now increasingly recognized as an issue of food production as well as distribution.

Are cities really viable entities in the long-run considering their huge footprints and hinterlands? Are they really future-proof if somewhere like London is only nine days away from running down essential supplies?Participant — Bristol roundtable

Lack of good quality land, lack of investment in productivity research and development, excessive reliance on fossil-fuel-driven increases in production, and of course the destructive impacts of climate change, are all increasing the pressure on food production globally. Climate change is projected to bring more extreme weather events (drought and flooding), more pests and diseases and potential eco-system breakdowns28

on both the domestic and global scales. Production in some of the ‘bread baskets’ in the western US and northeastern Brazil could be at risk in the medium term and with 50% of the world’s grain supply coming from irrigated land, drought-driven crop failure and accelerated demand will make price volatility an unwelcome characteristic of the next decade.

If we’re going to live sustainably, isn’t some more protectionism – even more localism through things like food production – inevitable?Participant — London roundtable

For water, there is the issue of supply. Whilst many parts of the UK have abundant water and with the right investment will be able to cope with greater demand, the East and South East of England are designated as water-stressed regions on a par with southern Spain and Italy. As numbers increase here, demand will be much harder to meet. Water will very likely be used more intensively, which in turn means that water treatment will also require further investment.

Volumes of waste are also likely to increase. Whilst we may be recycling more of our waste, the total amount of waste produced annually has not changed significantly since 1997.29

A higher population will also affect attempts to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases from the UK, making it more difficult for the country to meet its absolute reduction targets to tackle climate change. The UK targets are to cut emissions by 80% from 1990 levels by 2050, and 34–42% from 1990 levels by 2020. In 2008, per capita emissions were 10.330 tonnes of CO2e31 a year. If our population remained stable, emissions would have to be cut to 7.3–8.332 tonnes a head by 2020 to achieve the 34–42% target. But if the population grows as projected, emissions will need to be reduced to 6.7–7.733 tonnes per person – a cut of another tonne solely due to population growth. The 2050 per capita budget reduces from 2.5 tonnes to 234 tonnes when we take account of UK population growth.

2.2Socialandeconomicwellbeing

The second broad area of impacts we reviewed encompasses social and economic wellbeing.

Implicit in the UK’s current approach to population growth

is the idea that we continually need both an increasing population overall and an increasing flow of incoming migrants to keep the economy vibrant, to counterbalance an ageing society, and to pay for future pensions and care for the elderly. This approach is made explicit in the Scottish Government’s economic strategy, which has set a target to match average European (EU-15) population growth over the period from 2007 to 2017, supported by increased healthy life expectancy in Scotland over this period.35

22 Social Market Foundation, ‘Should the Green belt be preserved?’, August 2007 http://www.smf.co.uk/should-the-green-belt-be- preserved.html 23 The Guardian, ‘Homes need to be built on greenbelt’, report claims, 2007 http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/aug/15/communities. immigrationpolicy 24 CPRE CPRE, website, 2009 http://www.cpre.org.uk/campaigns/ planning/green-belts/what-cpre-is-doing 25 Environment Agency, Flooding in England – A National Assessment of Flood risk, 200926 Environment Agency, Flooding in England – A National Assessment of Flood risk, 200927 NFU, Why Faming Matters Even More, 2009 http://www.whyfarmingmatters.co.uk/x551.xml 28 Defra, UK Food Security Assessment, 2009 http://www.defra.gov.uk/foodfarm/food/security/ 29 Defra, Household waste and recycling: 1983/4–2007/08, http://www.defra.gov.uk/evidence/statistics/environment/waste/ kf/wrkf04.htm 30 Based on 2008 Total UK emissions 629.6 million tonnes and a 2008 population of 61.4 million National statistics – 2007 UK final figures, Annex B http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/ content/cms/statistics/climate_change/climate_change.aspx ONS mid 2008 estimates 31 Carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) There are six main greenhouse gases which cause climate change and are limited by the Kyoto protocol. Each gas has a different global warming potential. For simplicity of reporting, the mass of each gas emitted is commonly translated into a carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) amount so that the total impact from all sources can be summed to one figure. http://www.carbontrust.co.uk/solutions/carbonfootprinting/ carbon_footprinting_glossary.htm 32 Based on a 34% cut to 1990 Total UK emissions of 773.8 million tonnes and a population of 61.4 million National statistics – 2007 UK final figures, Annex B http://www.decc.gov.uk/en/content/ cms/statistics/climate_change/climate_change.aspx ONS mid 2008 estimates 33 Based on the principle 2020 population projection of 66.522 million ONS 2008-based National Population Projections, Principle projection 34 Based on the principle 2051 population projection of 77.073 million ONS 2008-based National Population Projections, Principle projection14 The Scottish Government, The Government 35 Economic Strategy, 2007, http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/11/12115041/4

And such thinking is by no means confined to the UK, with similar policies in Italy and Japan, for example. Many see this argument as problematic. As we will see, it may have some validity in the immediate term – though even this can be questioned. But more importantly, it is unsustainable in the longer-term. All those young economically active people will themselves be old one day, which would necessitate ever further growth and the concomitant rise in resources use and greenhouse gas emissions.

An ever-increasing population – getting more people to pay for the people we already have – doesn’t seem sustainable; we need to be careful we don’t get locked into a cycle where we require constant population growth.Participant — Edinburgh roundtable

It is well known that the UK population is ageing. Between 1982 and 2007, the number of people aged 65 and over increased by 16%, from 8.5 million to 9.8 million.36 The over-65s are projected to increase in number by 66% between 2007 and 2032, to make up nearly 23% of the total UK population. The fastest increase has been in the group known as the ‘oldest old’ – those aged 85 and over. This group has more than doubled in number since 1982 to 1.3 million people in 2007 and is expected to more than double again by 2032. This demographic transition is occurring across the industrialised world and is an unprecedented event in the history of humanity. There are currently 3.2 people of working age supporting each pensioner in Britain; by 2033, this number is expected to fall to 2.837 if the projected population increase occurs.

Such a large demographic shift is thought to threaten the long-term viability of our pensions system, with not enough people in employment paying taxes and National Insurance to cover future pension entitlements. However, Lord Turner (who chaired the Government’s Pensions Commission) asserts that the view that we need to raise fertility or increase immigration in order to maintain pensions is “overstated and wrong”, and that current UK population growth is higher than is needed for pension reasons.38

Some economists argue that increasing population numbers is essential to economic growth; a greater number of economically active people will generate economic surpluses that will help pay for services. This may well hold true in

the medium term. However, this is not necessarily the case either in the short-term, when increased numbers will impact on existing resources, or in the longer-term, when these extra people themselves become more dependent on public services.

There is a further argument that we need population growth – particularly immigration – to maintain the skills needed to support a vibrant economy. Migrants clearly do bring new skills and entrepreneurship. Migrant workers currently form a large proportion of the social care workforce. In London, one in two care workers are non-EU citizens.39 A recent government restriction imposed through the new points system (that only the most skilled care-workers earning £8.80 an hour can be recruited from outside the EU) has met with strong concerns from the care sector and Trade Unions. UNISON national secretary Heather Wakefield recently stated “The UK relies heavily on the efforts of overseas care workers, and due to population change, we are going to need far more of them, not less.”40

Increased population growth in Scotland is essential; the government can take some very easy decisions by moving more government jobs up north. Scotland has no problems with water, energy, space.Participant — Edinburgh roundtable

The CBI argues that: “Migrants to the UK bring valuable skills and ideas with them and help to fill job vacancies where Britons are unable or unwilling to do so. Their taxes help pay for our public services and our pensions, long after many migrants have returned home. Their presence also helps keep inflation low at a time when there are forces pushing the other way.” Brendan Barber, TUC General Secretary, said that: “Migrant workers fill an important gap in the UK’s growing labour market. Independent reports show that migrants are net contributors to government revenue while giving our economic growth a major boost.”41 US academic Richard Florida argues strongly for the economic benefits of diversity.42

However, as anyone who reads newspapers or watches television in the UK will know, there are also concerns about the impacts that increased levels of immigration could have.A recent poll found that 62 per cent of people believe that “British identity” is now under threat from new arrivals.43

Social tension may result where population increases put pressure on scarce resources and infrastructure and there is a risk that this is exacerbated by tensions around immigrant communities.

Migration has been crucial to some areas, for example by helping to keep open a school that might otherwise have closed down.Participant — London roundtable

There have already been claims from the HM Inspectorate of Education44 and the Chief Constable of Cambridgeshire Constabulary45 that recent numbers of immigrants have put strain on public services. For example, research published by the ‘Cross-party Group for Balanced Migration’ showed that by 2013 an extra 96,000 primary school places will be needed in England and Wales due to net inward migration, the equivalent of nearly 500 primary schools.46

To maintain quality services such as healthcare and education as the population rises, careful planning and major new investment will be necessary.

36 National Statistician’s annual article on the population, Population Trends No 134 Winter 200837 Office for National Statistics Press release, ‘UK population projected to grow by 4 million over the next decade’, 21 October 2009, http://www.statistics.gov.uk/StatBase/Product.asp?vlnk=8519 38 Phil. Trans. R. Soc B 2009 364 Population Ageing: What should we worry about? Adair Turner, October 200939 LGA, ‘The impact of the recession on migrant labour’, Jan 2009, quoting Jo Cleary, co-chair of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services (ADASS) Workforce Development Network 40 Ibid, quoting http://www.localgov.co.uk/index.cfm?method= news.detail&ID=71399&&keywords=migration 41 The Independent, Migrants are essential for business growth-says CBI, 2007 42 Richard Florida, The Rise of the Creative Class, 200243 Respondents were asked whether they agreed or disagreed with the following statement: “Britain will soon lose it’s unique identity if immigration continues as it is” Opinion Research Business, ‘UK attitudes towards immigration’ (carried out on behalf of BBC Newsnight), November 2007 44 BBC news, ‘Schools ‘hamper’ migrant children’, 2009 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/8267623.stm 45 BBC news, ‘Police chief fears migrant impact’, 2007 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7001768.stm 46 Cross-Party Group for balanced migration, ‘Immigration fuels need for hundreds more primary schools’, 2009 http://www.balancedmigration.com/pressreleases/ Pressureonprimaryschools(Rev6).pdf

8 — What are the potential sustainability impacts of this growth for the UK?

What are the potential sustainability impacts of this growth for the UK? — 9

2.3Infrastructure

A rapidly growing population will increase demands for housing and infrastructure – ranging from roads and utilities to hospitals, schools and shops.

Demand for housing already outstrips supply, a situation that has been made worse by the lack of building during the economic downturn. The latest household projections for England for 203147 show that if current trends persist, we would gain an average of 252,000 households per year– a total increase of 6.3 million over the fifteen years from 2006 to 2031.

Part of this is due to social changes, specifically a trend for smaller households. With more people living alone rather than in larger families – especially older people – the demand for housing is on the rise. But the increase in overall numbers is also a major factor. For example, in the South East region, which has the largest projected absolute increase in households of 39,000 per year from 2006 to 2031 (a 28 per cent increase on the 2006 level), three quarters of this projected increase is due to population levels, and only 16% due to changes in household formation.48

The projected demand for housing in this region is particularly worrying because the South East has been declared an area of ‘serious’ water stress. The Environment Agency estimates that to provide the equipment, facilities and services necessary for managing water supply, waste water, flood risk and food security for the South East Plan49 would require an investment of £20,000 per household.

New houses have to be serviced with new roads, amenities, utilities and additional public services. Many towns in Britain have grown very quickly in the past few decades, but investment in housing hasn’t always been matched by investment in the services (such as schools, shops, public transport, health services and so on) needed to ensure that the people living in those new houses can live sustainable lives. Housing with an inadequate level of services risks ‘locking in’ large numbers of people to car dependency or leaving them facing social deprivation.

Transport systems are likely to be strongly affected by population growth. The total volume of UK traffic rose by 14% between 1997 and 2007, with increases every year. If this trend

continues, we can expect increased congestion as the population rises. The CBI has estimated that £20 billion is already lost every year to the UK economy because of congestion.50

Similarly, the rail network has been under pressure for several years, and will require considerable increases in investment to cope with increasing passenger numbers. These have already increased from 976 million to 1,232 million (up 20%) between 2003 and 2008.51 Our major cities will face additional pressure on public transport infrastructure more generally, especially at peak times. In London, for example, 60% of businesses already consider inadequate transport infrastructure is having a negative effect on their business,52 while Transport for London has suggested that the estimated population growth in the capital will translate into four million extra journeys a day which will have to be catered for.53

Redistribution of the population around the country needs to be considered more seriously. Also there may be settlements of optimum size we want to aim for; incentives will be important. Participant — Bristol roundtable

2.4Conclusion So, according to commentators, there are both costs and benefits to the UK from population growth. A further 9 million people by 2030 will increase pressures on public services, infrastructure and the natural environment. Many of these issues will be made worse depending on where people choose to live. Although all parts of the UK are expected to experience a rise in population by 2031, certain locations, such as London, the South East, the Midlands and the North West, will face particular challenges due to existing high levels of population density and the expectation of double-digit percentage population growth. Many of these problems are due to the rate of growth and will need good planning to accommodate them.

On the other hand, growth increases the numbers of economically active people and can help the UK continue to be a vibrant, multicultural society. Our roundtables had a very mixed view of the impacts, with participants in Scotland, for example, arguing strongly for the economic benefits of population growth. Participants in London were particularly worried about infrastructure planning

and provision. While those in Bristol focused heavily on distribution and density.

Population density is very important to consider…High population density is more efficient for energy, transport and the provision of services. Participant — Bristol roundtable

There is logic in the argument that we need growth in our population to sustain both our economy and our ageing population, just as there is logic in the argument about the challenges of population growth. It is difficult to see how to resolve this tension. As commentator Zoe Williams pointed out in a recent article in The Guardian, “…the mainstream – thoughtful people, researchers, philosophers, academics, not just politicians – seems to be holding two warring views at once. In a conversation or policy document about long-term welfare and immigration, we absolutely have to breed more; in a conversation about climate change and diminishing resources, we absolutely have to stop breeding.”54

However, in a world of finite resources, which are already under pressure, it would be difficult to countenance a population that was required to continue growing ad infinitum. The ‘new blood’ argument also suggests that – as the population continues to age – we would need ever more young migrants to support those elderly – both in the UK and globally. This would be a pyramid scheme. The population cannot keep growing forever. At some point, we will have to come up with an alternative model.

47 Department for Communities and Local Government, Household projections to 2031, England, March 200948 Department for Communities and Local Government, Household projections to 2031, England, March 200949 The Environment Agency South East Plan, 2006, http://www.southeast-ra.gov.uk/sep_submitted.html#exec_sum 50 This calculation is based upon research undertaken in France (Bouladon, 1991; and Quinet, 1994), which suggested that congestion costs were 3.2% of GDP in the UK. Research by Newbery (1995) tended to support this figure with an estimate of £19.1 billion. http://www.cereslogistics.co.uk/docs/library/pdfs/RoadCongestion.pdf 51 Office of Rail Regulation, National Rail Trends 2007-2008 Yearbook, http://www.rail-reg.gov.uk/upload/pdf/375.pdf52 CBI/GVA Grimley, Corporate Real estate survey, 2008 www.gvagrimley.co.uk/x7648.xml 53 Transport for London,T2025, 2006, http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/corporate/T2025.pdf 54 The Guardian, ‘To breed or not to breed’, 2009 http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/apr/15/ zoe-williams-population-growth

Currently, it is estimated that total human economic activity already uses over 40% of the biological productivity of the earth each year 55. Moreover, the resources we use (biological and mineral) are processed in an extremely inefficient way, generating waste and pollution (including greenhouse gases) that are as damaging as they are unnecessary. Included in that profligacy is the way we use fossil fuels as a source of heat, power and light.

David Attenborough recently posed a key question: “How many people can live on planet earth?”. The answer is not just a factor of how many of us there are, but also what we do.

One helpful way of understanding the different points of leverage in creating a sustainable future is the I=PxAxT equation, published by Ehrlich and Holden in the early 1970s.56 ‘I’ represents the impact on the environment; ‘P’ is the population or number of people; ‘A’ represents affluence, or consumption per capita; and ‘T’ the technology which determines how efficiently resources are used. So impact on the environment is a factor of the number of people, how much each consumes and how efficient that consumption is. In broad terms, society can tackle any of these factors in order to reach its environmental goals.

Although presented as a matter of multiplication, a crude relationship between the factors does not necessarily hold good. For example a doubling of population need not mean a doubling of resource consumption. Nor does the equation take account of the different carrying capacities of different local environments. But what this equation suggests is that if we want to limit the impact on the environment, we can intervene in a number of areas to lower environmental impact: i.e. reduce absolute consumption per capita, improve technological efficiency of any consumption that does take place, or have fewer people consuming in the first place.

Forum for the Future believes that we need to do all three: innovate radically more efficient technologies; find new ways of living fulfilling lives that consume fewer resources; and aim for the low end of the population projections. We can take each of these points of leverage in turn.

3. is it sensible or desirable to intervene in UK population growth?

Atitssimplest,unsustainabledevelopmentisaconsequenceofanimbalancebetweenthedemandsofthehumanpopulationandthecapacityoftheearthtosupplytheresourcesandecosystemservicestomeetthesedemands.

55 Vitousek PM, Ehrlich PR, Ehrlich AH, and Matson PA, ‘Human Appropriation of the Products of Photosynthesis’ Bioscience 36, 368, 1986

56 Paul R. Ehrlich and John P Holdren, American Scientist 62, ‘Human Population and the Global Environment’, 1974

10 — Is it sensible or desirable to intervene in UK population growth?

Is it sensible or desirable to intervene in UK population growth? — 11

3.2Affluence

Tackling consumption levels will also need to be part of the picture. This is hardly an attractive proposition to put before the British people, especially after the experience of the recession. Yet, it is clear from longitudinal studies of happiness or life satisfaction that our levels of material consumption are not increasing overall wellbeing. What these studies, summarised in a Cabinet Office review from some years ago,60 tend to show is happiness rising with GDP until basic needs are met, at which point GDP increases without any positive effect on happiness – and indeed in some graphs, happiness actually begins to tail off.

Oliver James’s book ‘affluenza’ describes the typical consumer in a developed economy as stuck in a vicious circle of consuming more to be happy, finding that consumption does not generate happiness over time, being encouraged to think that more consumption is the answer, using unsustainable levels of resource to consume, getting into debt, becoming stressed, and seeking solace in still more material consumption.

Does the UK want to be a fully self-sustainable island that totally internalises its costs? If so, you’re probably looking at trying to get down to a population of just 20–30 million! We really need scenarios that indicate – at a particular level of lifestyle, what the UK population carrying capacity is – for different levels of lifestyle and self-sustainability.Participant — Bristol roundtable

3.3Numbersofpeople

Alongside improving efficiency and tackling consumption levels, it must therefore make good sense to see how best to constrain overall numbers where possible. The two main areas where such interventions could happen on the UK scale are reproduction and migration. Looked at on the global scale, reproduction is the important issue, though migration impacts will affect particular local environments.

Family planning

In the UK, access to family planning is freely available through GPs and community-based services. However, 40% of pregnancies in the UK are unplanned. Whilst there has been a general downward trend in teenage pregnancy numbers over the last 10 years, the UK still has the highest teenage pregnancy rates in Western Europe.61 Given this, there are clearly still many barriers to accessing family planning.

A recent report by the Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health and HIV recommended that the Government should improve information about all contraceptive methods and signposting to services, including high profile public information campaigns.62

But there are more barriers to accessing family planning than just lack of information. This includes wider determinants such as culture and religion, stigma or social exclusion, and more needs to be done to understand these barriers. Tackling these barriers is part of reducing health inequalities and addressing inequities in service access and provision more generally.

Is it ever ethical to imply a “correct” number of children? People have children for many different personal reasons and perhaps that shouldn’t be interfered with.Participant — London roundtable

The number of children people have should of course be a matter of free choice. However, if we succeed in increasing awareness of the global and local impacts of a larger UK population, people’s attitudes to the number of children they have may change. For example, the Optimum Population Trust’s “Stop at Two” campaign encourages people to pledge that they will have no more than two children for humanitarian and sustainability-related reasons.

3.1Efficiency The UK can increase the efficiency with which it produces, consumes and disposes of resources.

For some factors, such as CO2 and other greenhouse gases, we have fairly clear scientific data on the carrying capacity of the planet and thus the reductions or efficiency improvements needed. For other resources, we can look at the UK’s carrying capacity in different areas, as for example with land. At the moment, Britain imports nearly 40% of its food, most of its energy and nearly all of its fibre. In 2007, Simon Fairlie asked the question: ‘Can Britain Feed Itself?’57 He concluded that there were some hard choices to be made about what we use land for. The implications for securing food supplies and water for both drinking and agriculture in a world increasingly compromised by climate change are already enormous. The UK should be aiming to become better at using its basic resources and there is growing acceptance of the importance of achieving greater food security for the UK amongst all the political parties.

Alongside this, it is also possible to estimate global carrying capacity for certain resources and pollutants and then work out the UK share. The work of the Global Footprint Network suggest that humanity is already using 1.4 planet’s worth of resources – a figure set to grow – whilst the ecological footprint of the UK is around four times its biocapacity.58

Existing patterns can be highly inefficient, for example with water use, there is much that needs to be done through retrofitting etc. even without any increase in population. Participant — London roundtable

What these estimates show is that massive improvements in resource efficiency are already urgently needed. And if we are going to have to contend with millions of extra people here in the UK, we will need further improvements in resource efficiency on top of these improvements. As Tim Jackson’s new book, ‘Prosperity without Growth’,59 demonstrates, there comes a point where the efficiency challenge becomes so overwhelming as to force us to look at the other variables – numbers of people and levels of consumption.

57 Simon Fairlie, The Land magazine, ‘Can Britain Feed itself?’, 200758 Global Footprint Network, World Footprint, http://www.footprintnetwork.org/ 59 Tim Jackson, Prosperity without Growth – Economics for a finite planet, 2009 60 The Strategy Unit, Cabinet Office, Life satisfaction: The state of knowledge and implications for government, 200261 BBC news, ‘40% of pregnancies unplanned’, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3515400.stm 62 Independent Advisory Group on Sexual Health and HIV, The Time is Now, 2008

There is a long-standing inverse link between prosperity and fertility, so do we really need extra policies? Participant — Bristol roundtable

Current tax structures and family leave structures give us a system where taxpayers and employers have effectively agreed to provide continually increasing levels of support for a family of any size (e.g. tax credits, tax-beneficial childcare vouchers and increases in statutory maternity pay). There would clearly be very difficult issues in reframing these benefits whilst creating a family-friendly society where no child is in poverty, but government may need to rethink the direction of incentives.

On global issues – the numbers are worrying and we do need to hold growth down; there are ethical questions around saying one thing and doing another ourselves. Participant — Edinburgh roundtable

Ageing Medical advances have been largely responsible for recent improvements in mortality rates. For example, coronary heart disease mortality declined by over 50 per cent in England and Wales between 1981 and 2000 for men and women aged 25 to 84.63 Another factor is the decrease in the prevalence of smoking in the UK which, for example, has caused falling lung cancer rates.64

Factors that could increase the future mortality rate include decreasing resistance to infectious diseases and negative impacts on health from increased stress levels and obesity in some sections of the population.65 However, while increased obesity levels are likely to lead to increased future morbidity, it is less clear how future mortality will be affected. Mortality rates among the young have not followed a downward trend; in the 1980s and 1990s rates increased for young ages as deaths related to AIDS, drug and alcohol abuse and violence more than offset improvements in health-related causes of death at these ages.66 Clearly, everything should be done to tackle these future problems.

There is significant uncertainty as to whether the increase in life expectancy will also lead to a similar increase in healthy

12 — Is it sensible or desirable to intervene in UK population growth?

life expectancy. The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology has prepared three scenarios for healthy life expectancy: the first scenario, ‘Compression of morbidity’, envisages a healthier, older population whose care costs are mainly restricted to the last eighteen months before death and are mitigated by their extra years of active life; ‘Expansion of morbidity’ describes a future where healthy life expectancy has remained static while life expectancy has grown, leading to a spiralling dependency burden; ‘Dynamic equilibrium’ represents a future where the older population suffers fewer instances of severe disability than today but higher levels of light to moderate disability, and care costs are broadly similar to those of today.67

People don’t want to live longer if it means a worse quality of life for longer. People are already questioning certain treatments and operations now. There is a natural progression towards active management of death, more palliative care, and making end-of-life a quality-of-life discussion. Participant — Bristol roundtable

Longer lives aren’t necessarily better if they aren’t healthier. A report in 2005 recommended that to reduce the future pressures on the NHS from an ageing population, a key aim of government policy should be to encourage people to remain active, engage in regular exercise and refrain from behaviours that could have a detrimental effect on their health.68 There are signs that attitudes are changing to extending human life. For example, in July 2009, the Royal College of Nursing moved to a neutral position on assisted suicide.69 There could be a shift to more palliative care for the elderly.

Is it all about choice and flexibility? Will we need harder measures such as an older retirement age, co-housing for old people? Participant — Edinburgh roundtable

Not only are people living longer, but the high numbers of ageing baby boomers will swell the number of the elderly. The baby boomers were born during a period of rapid population growth and social change between 1946–64, with 17 million births recorded in Britain alone during this period. As the population ages, difficulties will arise in financially supporting the growing number of the elderly and there will be implications for pensions.

Immigration

The ONS has calculated that 44% of the recent rise in the UK’s population is due to migration. However, long-term trends show a levelling off of the increase in immigration since 2004, and a sharp increase in the number of emigrants in the last two or three years. The net migration rate into the UK is in fact quite modest after all the changes that have now been introduced and one of the most highly controlled in the EU. With the right interventions to help reduce unplanned pregnancies, and the growth of a culture that frames any decision about having a child in the larger context of sustainability, the population projections both for increases due to migration and for increases due to ‘natural’ growth can be turned onto the kind of net reduction path implied by the lower projections for population growth.

Immigration is already very heavily controlled, how can it get any tougher? Participant — Edinburgh roundtable

There is the environmental impact of migrants to consider, they tend to massively increase their footprints after they arrive and adopt UK lifestyles. Participant — Bristol roundtable

Limiting immigration would certainly help reduce UK population growth and associated impacts; but it would have no impact on the global population picture. There is an argument that in moving to the UK, immigrants tend to increase their environmental footprint compared to their country of origin, but this is a marginal issue.

63 National Statistician’s annual article on the population, Population Trends No 134 Winter 200864 Ibid65 Government Actuary’s Department, National Population Projections expert advisory group, Influences on future trends http://www.gad.gov.uk/Demography%20Data/Population/2006/ methodology/expert1.html 66 National Statistician’s annual article on the population, Population Trends No 134 Winter 2008 67 Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, Healthy Life Expectancy, postnote February 2006 no 257 68 BMJ, Dr Foster’s case notes, 200569 Royal College of Nursing, ‘RCN moves to neutral position on assisted suicide’, 2009

Is it sensible or desirable to intervene in UK population growth? — 13

We can intervene positively in the developing world at the moment – via aid, preventing deforestation, encouraging low carbon development and so on. Participant — Bristol roundtable

We are a democracy, I can’t see people accepting the responsibility for climate refugees. I can imagine people saying our generation wasn’t responsible for most of it and pushing for a fortress UK, a fortress Europe. The drumbeat for that is likely to become louder. Participant — Bristol roundtable

For the EU, migration pressures from North and West Africa and Asia are likely to intensify, as the impacts of climate change are felt. And by mid-century, we may even see climate change forcing migration within the EU. For the southern-most countries in Europe, climate change may add to existing problems of desertification, water scarcity and food production, while also introducing new threats to human health, ecosystems and national economies. For example, limited water availability already poses a major problem in many parts of southern Europe. This situation is likely to deteriorate further due to climate change, with Europe’s high water stress areas expected to increase from 19% of the land area today to 35% by the 2070s.74

3.5Conclusion

Set against this global background, what can we say about the ‘right’ population for the UK? Should we aim to defend our affluence (‘A’); do we define UK sustainability by what is available within our own territorial resource base or as part of a globalised economy; do we say that because we can drive technology (‘T’) down hard in a highly developed economy with a dense settlement pattern we can actually deliver more sustainable living for more people than other parts of the world?

We shouldn’t get too rigid about sustainability within certain borders. Where do you stop? A totally self-sustaining Bristol within its city limits? Participant — Bristol roundtable

Whilst a population of 70 million is not inherently unsustainable, managing that level of population sustainably will require an extraordinary combination of planning, investment, and innovation. And we are likely to have a better quality of life if we set our policies to achieve the lower projections.

‘Who?’ and ‘where?’ may be more important than ‘how many?’: some places in the UK may need to grow: it’s not all about overall numbers, but where people are located may be more important. Participant — London roundtable

Does it matter what the UK does in the global context? It could be argued that the UK is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, representing just under 1% of the global population. Developed countries should work together to address some of the reasons why people need to migrate by increasing overseas aid and providing additional resources on top of the aid budget for climate change adaptation.

But the UK also needs to play its part at home. On the efficiency front, it should be leading by example and reducing its own resource use per capita before lecturing others. It should also be using this efficiency agenda to drive technological development that can then be shared more widely. But it should also be addressing it’s own pressing population issues rather than pretending that they’re of no significance.

Even if we wanted to stop numbers coming in, is fortress Britain a practical possibility in a globalised world? Don’t we need to plan anyway for this increase? Participant — London roundtable

3.4Long-termresilience

There is, in the longer term, a real possibility that any attempts to manage population numbers in the UK will be frustrated by an influx of climate refugees. The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) is making plans based on conservative estimates that climate change will force as many as 250 million people from their homes by 2050.70 To put this figure in context, the total number of displaced people in the world at the end of 2007 was 67 million, of whom 25 million had been forced from their homes by natural disasters.71 The UNHCR figures mean a displacement of around six million people per year, three million affected by sudden disasters and another three million spurred to migrate by gradual change such as rising sea levels and salinity. Although most refugees are not expected to leave their own national borders72 (at present, over 80% of refugees remain within their region of origin, including neighbouring countries)73 the UK will clearly have a responsibility to the international community to take climate change refugees since we are a major cause of climate change.

70 According to L. Craig Johnstone, the U.N. Deputy High Commissioner for Refugees 71 Ibid72 Reuters, ‘UN says climate change may uproot 6 mln annually’, 2008 http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/B362707.htm 73 UNHCR, Global trends, 200774 Climate Change 2007: Working Group II: Impacts, Adaption and Vulnerability, Executive summary http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg2/en/ ch12s12-es.html

It’s clear that Sir David Attenborough was thinking globally in making that hard-hitting comment. There are still many countries in the world where population growth and high average fertility rates are having a serious impact on the economic aspirations and environmental problems faced by those countries. In its two reports in 2007 and 2009, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Population, Development and Reproductive Health focused in particular on the impact of population growth on the Millennium Development Goals, pointing out that, with the exception of a few oil-rich states, developing countries have not escaped from poverty whilst still having high average fertility rates.

World population is a key determinant of our ability to live in balance with the planet. In order to make informed policy, not driven by ideology, prejudice or dogma, we need, as a matter of urgency, to better understand our impacts and manage them more effectively. Only with better knowledge of this kind can we say what is sustainable by way of standards of human welfare or population. In the meantime, faced with robust evidence that we are already eroding our life-support systems, humankind should be pursuing a precautionary policy of restraining and reversing population growth on a global scale.

Here in the UK, it’s obviously a rather different set of challenges that we’re looking at, but it makes no sense for us to treat ‘population issues’ as something of concern only in developing and emerging countries. Indeed, there is something quite distasteful about the rhetoric of those who inveigh against ‘the scourge of population growth’ in the poor world, without ever taking into account the implications of continuing population growth in countries like the UK and the USA.

So what are the practical implications of that for policy makers – for all of us – here in the UK? This paper has tried to synthesise the facts, views, worries and suggestions from the various workshops we held and the research we have done to draw some conclusions about appropriate areas for action. The expectation is that policy makers should take the lead – particularly politicians – but that clearly there is an obligation on all of us to contribute the best we can wherever we are.

4. conclusions: improving the way we address population

“I’veneverseenaproblemthatwouldn’tbeeasiertosolvewithfewerpeople,orharder,andultimatelyimpossible,withmore”.Sir David Attenborough

14 — Conclusions: improving the way we address population

challenging if we were to include the tonnes of CO2 emitted in other countries and imported as food or other products,76 which many people now believe is the fairest way to proceed.

We also need to consider where population growth in the UK will be concentrated and the differential impacts that this will have. It’s not all about overall numbers, but also where people are located. Double-digit population growth is projected for almost every region, but policy could help to direct growth away from those areas already facing stresses. Some parts of the UK could indeed benefit from population growth; for example, at our Scottish roundtable, we heard a desire for more skilled workers in Scotland.77 To make sensible, far-sighted decisions about accommodating continuing population growth requires effective regional planning processes.

4.3 Rethink ‘growth’

We found considerable support for the view that we should no longer defer the discussion on how our economy could prosper with no population growth. Models that rely on constant growth to keep the UK economy vibrant and pay for an ageing population are clearly unsustainable in the long-term.

And those discussions need to be set in a broader context. Whether the world’s population grows quickly or follows a path set out by the lower UN projections, we can be sure of one thing: if we carry on pursuing economic growth based on ever-increasing consumption volumes, our planet will not sustain us. An increasing number of thinkers are now arguing that conventional economic growth should not remain the sole measure of a country’s or a company’s success. The Sarkozy Commission (2009) has reported on new ways of judging success that consider the immediate situation, as well as how current activity enables or compromises future sustainability. Critically, it sees the family and its well-being, not economic output, as the unit that counts.78

Most classical economic theory still supports the expansion of population as a means of creating an economic surplus. This analysis is now dangerously outdated because classical economics has ignored the “boundary conditions” set on the economy by the ecological and physical limits of the planet. We should, therefore, aim for the redefinition of human well-being and quality of life in terms of a much broader basket of economic, social and ecological factors.

4.4 New attitudes to ageing

There is growing acceptance, echoed in our workshops, that we will need to adopt new, more flexible attitudes both to ageing and to when people work during their lifetimes. Fundamentally, the UK will need a shift in attitude towards seeing the ageing of the population as an opportunity. We need to value the additional experience, talent and skills that can be brought to the workforce. We could also encourage more flexible working patterns. We need to shift the focus to healthier lives, not just longer lives, and place greater emphasis on healthier lives right through to old age. We can rethink how to spread work, take time out for rearing children or caring for family or for learning throughout our lives.

For example, the UK will clearly need to raise the age of retirement, and simultaneously encourage people to save more. Although increasing the age of retirement is a politically and socially controversial policy, the then Shadow Chancellor George Osborne announced in October 2009 that he would increase the retirement age to 66 in 2016 – around a decade earlier than had been planned by the outgoing government which was planning a rise from 65 to 66 for both men and women between 2024 and 2026.79 (An increase in the retirement age will, of course, have different implications for different sectors. For example, it would be misguided to expect people to continue hard physical work at older ages.)

4.1 Plan for what’s coming

Even the lowest-range official estimate (which assumes low growth in life expectancy, declines in fertility, and significantly lower levels of migration than we have seen since the mid-1990s) results in a UK population projection of 66.8 million by 2030.75 This is over 8% higher than today and would still require serious planning.

So, as well as examining how we might constrain total numbers, we also need to plan better for what is to come. We already face challenges on infrastructure, services and the environment, through more single households, more people travelling further and increasing consumption levels. These will all be exacerbated by population growth and the impacts of climate change. Tensions develop when there is a feeling that the economy and infrastructure are under increased pressure, so the UK needs to ensure there are adequate public services, infrastructure, training and jobs.

There is no reason why all the major public infrastructure bodies should not start explicitly addressing population growth straight away and carry out detailed planning for the impacts. One effect of such detailed planning will be to bring the issues into starker focus and so clarify a better range of solutions.

4.2 Use what we have more efficiently

The UK also needs targets for more efficient use of resources to ensure it can meet its existing environmental commitments at whatever level of population growth. The UK will need to greatly improve the resource efficiency of our public services and infrastructure. In many ways, the challenge of UK population growth goes hand in hand with the challenge of sustainability. Zero-carbon homes, maximising the use of technologies based on renewable energy, improved water efficiency, innovative ways to reduce flood risk and a coherent, efficient transport system will all be essential.

It will also require much more serious planning for the physical infrastructure that would make life enjoyable in the very low carbon economy that is implicit in the UK’s legally binding CO2 reduction targets (34–42%% by 2020, 80% by 2050 from 1990 levels). We have to move from over 10 tonnes per capita today, to seven tonnes by 2020 and two or fewer tonnes by 2050. These figures would be even more

75 ONS2008-basedNational Population Projections http://www.statistics.gov.uk/downloads/theme_population/ NPP2008/wLfLleLmiUK08cc.xls76 ClimateChangeCommittee,Meeting Carbon Budgets – the need for a step change–12October200977 Scotlandroundtable78 CommissionontheMeasurementofEconomic PerformanceandSocialProgress,Issuespaper,2009, www.stiglitz-sen-fitoussi.fr79 LGA,The impact of the recession on migrant labour, Jan2009,quotinghttp://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/ news/uk/article4882573.ece

Conclusions: improving the way we address population — 15

Very few people migrate away from home except for exceptional reasons. Making it possible for people to feel safe and have confidence that they can meet their needs and aspirations close to where they live is vital for humanitarian as well as environmental reasons. That will mean interventions – with appropriate aid and other kinds of support – to reduce vulnerability to the economic, social and environmental upheavals that lead to movements of people. Making sufficient funding available for climate change adaptation will be particularly important. How easy it remains for us at home will depend to a large extent on how effective we are at helping others.

4.7 Have an open and sensible debate

Above all, participants in the discussions we have had wanted a more open and considered debate. It is time for population to be addressed by policy-makers. The issue should not be ignored simply because it’s controversial. We need to address public concerns head on, and we need to start planning for future population growth now.

Given the nature of the challenges set out above, debate about how to manage the UK’s population growth is worryingly absent. Far from engaging in serious discussions about dealing with population growth, we seem stuck on the question of whether we should even be having those discussions.

In spite of 70 per cent of the British public stating in a recent YouGov poll that they believe Britain’s population is too big,80 there has been little mention of population policies in Election manifestos81 of the major parties, other than the – often negatively framed – references to “managing migration.”

Many of the solutions to population growth (rethinking attitudes to fertility, ageing, migration and so on) hold difficult moral issues, which – not surprisingly – politicians tend to steer clear of. So it is hardly surprising that most politicians do not want to take a long-term view, and a ‘NIMTO’ attitude (Not in My Term of Office) usually prevails. Population policy is thus largely “laissez-faire” – let it happen.

This means that too often the debate around population is left to the far right. The BNP has shown rapid membership expansion in the UK, registering a near-fivefold increase from 2001 to 2007.82 The party polled almost one million votes at the recent European elections (6.2%), and gained its first two MEPs,83 and at the General Election, although not winning any Commons seats, the BNP increased its share of the national vote from 0.7 to 1.9 per cent.84

We found concern about the way politicians in the two main parties have been trying to meet the far right halfway with its anti-immigration rhetoric – talking about ‘clampdowns’ – as this just increases the public perception that immigration is a problem and getting out of control. It would be preferable for the main parties in the UK to address the population issue systematically in their policies, and to take the initiative themselves rather than responding piecemeal to an agenda increasingly owned by the far right.

We know how well received this debate would be by huge numbers of people in the UK. ‘Growing pains: population and sustainability in the UK’, is based on extensive research, specialist interviews, and insights gathered from a series of workshops with policy-makers in London, Bristol and Edinburgh. The overwhelming message from those workshops – and this report – is that we urgently need a serious debate on population from the perspective of sustainable development, as the most likely way to arrive at the joined-up approach to policy that can deliver long-term solutions.

4.5 Enhance family planning

Many presume that, as a well-developed country, family planning services are easily available. We discovered that this is not so. Most Primary Care Trusts already have targets for improving family planning services and for reducing unwanted pregnancies, especially amongst teenagers. But few of those targets have been met. It’s clear that interventions in this area need to be made as early as possible in the lives of young adults, and recent changes regarding the way in which sex education will be taught in schools should help in that regard.

However, there is also a need for more targeted resources for young people and women in some of the most deprived communities across the UK. Many young girls and women are still unable to manage their own fertility. The full range of family planning services need to be made available and easy to access wherever the need is greatest.

Globally, there remains a vast unmet need for contraception. According to USAID, an estimated 350 million women lack access to the full range of methods. The Department for International Development here in the UK should reconsider the balance of investments for family planning programmes in the least developed countries, and make a far higher priority of this kind of funding.

4.6 A balanced discussion on immigration

Our discussions in the focus groups concluded that the argument that migrants ‘steal’ UK citizens’ jobs is best countered by a serious investment in raising education and skills levels all round. Migrants are often relatively well skilled, and the 2006 Leitch Review of Skills found that if the UK wanted to be in the upper quartile of OECD countries it would mean doubling the attainment at all levels of skills. Government clearly needs to be doing far more in this area.

It is extraordinarily dangerous to think of the UK as an embattled fortress in a world of growing sustainability pressures, fending off all comers and trying to make ourselves ‘All right Jack’, regardless of what happens elsewhere. There are profound objections, both practical and moral, to that position. Our contribution to lowering the value of P in the I=PxAxT equation, ie reducing population growth, must therefore be pursued abroad as well as at home.

80 ‘PublicSupportsSmallFamilies,SmallerPopulations, PollShows’http://www.optimumpopulation.org/releases/opt. release11Jul09.htm81 TheConservativesandLiberalDemocratsdomakeareference totheageingpopulation.TheConservativesdolinktherising populationwithpressuresonthewaterindustry.TheLiberal Democratsrefertoglobalpopulationandglobalfoodsecurity. TheGreenPartyhighlightsthepressureofpopulationgrowth onourglobalecologicalimpactandlinksimmigrationtolonger- termpressuresonoverallpopulation.82 HouseofCommonsLibrary,Membership of UK political parties, 2009http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/briefings/ snsg-05125.pdf83 BBCnews,‘Elections2009’.http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/bsp/hi/ elections/euro/09/html/ukregion_999999.stm84 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/election2010/results/

16 — Conclusions: improving the way we address population

Forum for the Future team:Peter MaddenJames GoodmanJoy GreenClare Jenkinson

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Date of publication:June 2010

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Discussion panelA number of people kindly gave their time to talk the issues through with us. They are not responsible for the views in the document.

Ben Plowden Transport for LondonDamian Green Conservative Party Dr William Bird Intelligent HealthHannah Bartram Environment AgencyHugh Raven Sustainable Development CommissionIan Ducat UNISON South WestJean Candler British Institute of Human RightsJill Mortimer Local Government AssociationJim Longhurst University of the West of EnglandKate Gordon Campaign to Protect Rural EnglandKirsty MacLachlan General Register Office for ScotlandLeslie Watson Sustainability South WestPaul Monaghan The Co-operative GroupPaul Rainger Forum for the FuturePeter Singleton Scottish Environment Protection Agency Richard Blakeway Greater London AuthorityRon Hewitt Edinburgh Chamber of CommerceRosamund McDougall Optimum Population TrustSandy Halliday Gaia researchSara Parkin Forum for the FutureSarah Mulley Institute for Public Policy Research Stuart Housden RSPB ScotlandSusan Deacon Queen Margaret UniversityYolanda Rizzi Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution

Final thoughts — 17

The seven broad implications for policy-makers that we have distilled from our enquiry are not a solution to the challenges of population growth, but they do set out where thought and action is needed. We need first to bring debate about the population of the UK and the world into the mainstream, and recognise that it is a sustainability issue. Understanding it in this way will allow us to approach it in a more integrated, long-term and balanced manner, to avoid knee-jerk responses and laissez-faire attitudes, and engage in a sensible debate about how to create a sustainable future for all people, near and far.

5.final thoughts

The answer to Sir David Attenborough’s question ‘How many people can live on Earth?’ is: “it depends”. The sustainability dynamic in the relationship between different elements of the I=PxAxT equation (see page 3) means that we can intervene in all sorts of ways to avoid worst-case scenarios. In this paper we have tried to address the P element in a way that makes it easier to understand the contribution that holding down the numbers of people in the UK could make to sustainable development.

The key message that we heard throughout this project is that it is feasible to hit the lower projections, both here in the UK and worldwide, and that achieving the lower projections will be relatively simple compared to the challenge of coping with the higher projections. Achieving that, and getting onto the lower projection trajectories that would follow, will ease other pressures enormously.

growing painspopulation and sustainability in the UK