Population growth
The estimated 2007 population of Tower Hamlets was 215,300.
Population in Tower Hamlets is set to increase faster than the rest
of London between now and 2026
The 2001 census population total for Tower Hamlets was 196,106.
Population growth up to 2001, for the ten years since the 1991
census, represented the second largest percentage increase for this
period of all the London boroughs at 17.9 per cent, or over 45,000
people.
The latest ONS figures estimate the 2007
population for Tower Hamlets at 215,300 (ONS mid-2007 population
estimates). Population growth in Tower Hamlets is predicted to
accelerate further, outstripping growth in London as well as in
other Inner London boroughs.
Projections by the Greater London Authority
suggest that between 2001 and 2026 the population will have
increased from more or less 200,000 to well over 300,000, due to a
combination of natural population growth and the effect of
regeneration initiatives (GLA 2007 Round Demographic Projections
(DMAG Briefing 2008-07).
This represents an average annual growth rate
of nearly 2 per cent, twice as high as that for Inner London and
nearly three times as high as that for Greater London.
In 2009, Mayhew Harper Associates Ltd was commissioned jointly
by Tower Hamlets Council and NHS Tower Hamlets to use their
neighbourhood knowledge management
(NKM) methodology to create a database of the
population of the borough, to estimate its size in comparison to
other estimates, and to produce further outputs from
the database. The study estimates a confirmed minimum population of
234,828 persons living in over 100,995 households, as at
30th September 2009.
Tower Hamlets has been identified by ONS as an area where there
is a significant risk of population under-estimate in the 2001
Census. This risk assessment is based on the high number of Census
variables associated with undercount present in the borough. These
include:
- the number of males aged between 25 and 39
- multi-occupancy
- unemployment
- country of birth
- number of dummy forms
- amount of private rented accommodation
To adjust for these factors nationally, ONS has issued several
revised mid-year estimates in the period since 2001.