For a vision of Britain's future, look to the schools

The minoritisation of white Brits is already nearly complete

Since the turn of the century, the United Kingdom has experienced rapid population growth and demographic change. The ONS estimates the population of the UK was 58.9 million in 2000, increasing to 69.5 million in 2025, an increase of 10.6 million people. Most of this increase has been driven by net migration. The Migration Observatory note that between 2005 and 2024, 68% of population growth has been driven by net migration, increasing to 99% since 2020. Until 2023, the population was still subject to natural increase — births exceeding deaths — despite below replacement birth rates.

The most recent national population projection from the ONS has the population of the UK hitting 71 million in 2034 and peaking at 72.5 million in 2054, then declining afterwards. This increase in the short term to 2034 is the result of a projected 6.4 million births, 6.9 million deaths, 7.3 million people immigrating to the UK and 5.1 million people emigrating from the UK, an overall increase of 1.7 million.

The white British share of the population in England and Wales has declined from 87.5% in 2001 to 80.5% in 2011 and 74.4% in 2021. That figure will have declined further since the 2021 census, particularly given the unprecedented level of immigration between 2021 and 2024 (the ‘Boriswave’). We won’t get the full picture until the next census in 2031, and what we see then will depend on how many of the Boriswave end up settling.

Several population projections based on census data show that the white British are set to become a minority sometime in the 2050s or 2060s. The census is, however, merely a snapshot in time and is not a leading indicator for what the future of the country might look like. This is because the census captures a lot of older people, whose numbers have less, if any, bearing on the future demographic make-up of the country. This point was echoed by demographer Paul Morland in an interview with Steven Edginton; the demographics of younger cohorts matter more, and they are on track to fall below the 50% threshold much sooner. The two leading indicators for demographic change are births and school entries. It can be argued that neither are as accurate or encompassing as the decadal census, which is considered by statisticians, demographers and researchers to be the gold standard. Nonetheless, the trends are clear and all moving in the same direction.

I have explored births previously in Pimlico Journal, covering the data between 2007 and 2023 here, and providing an update on 2024’s revised fertility rates here. Recently released ONS data for 2025 shows that 53.1% of births in England and Wales were white British, a slight decrease from 53.7% in 2024, down from 58.9% in 2021 and 66.3% in 2010. Birth statistics have some limitations; there is no way to account for internal migration (e.g., someone born in Scotland who moves to England or vice versa), those born here who emigrate, or those born in foreign countries who immigrate to the UK, often the dependants of migrants on work visas, or those arriving via family reunification or immediate settlement visas.

School statistics are another avenue that gives us a look into what the future of the country might look like even without large amounts of future immigration, assuming no major reversal of trends in the birth rate. Crucially, school statistics allow us to capture younger cohorts who have immigrated to the UK with their parents and who would therefore not be captured in birth statistics. The ethnicity of pupils is collected and published yearly as part of the annual school census. From what I can find, the ethnicity of pupils has been recorded in England since 1996, in Wales since 2004, in Scotland since 2003 and in Northern Ireland since 2006. If any earlier data is available, I have not been able to find it, or it does not exist on any record that is digitally accessible. With this information, we can map the change over time and create a time series.

The following statistics cover Government funded schools in England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. The headline pupil figures from these releases include those in hospital or independent (private) schools, however characteristics such as ethnicity are only recorded for those in state-funded schools or those with state-funded placements. These other school types only submit aggregate level returns, though in practice this makes little difference as the vast majority of pupils attend state schools. For example, in England when the most recent census took place in January 2026, there were a total of 8,920,227 pupils enrolled in schools in England. 8,359,455 out of 8,920,227 (93.7%) were in state-funded schools or had their placement funded by the state. The remaining 560,772 pupils were in independent, hospital or other miscellaneous schools. This closely matches the roughly 6-7% of the UK pupil population who are educated outside of state schools, most of whom will be educated in independent schools. 8,129,871 out of 8,359,455 (97.3%) were in a state funded primary or secondary school. The number of pupils outside state-funded primary and secondary schools is small and would not meaningfully impact headline figures or overall trends. As these releases cover England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland and span over two decades, the terminology has changed over time. In some of the releases you may see references to state-funded, maintained, grant funded, grant aided etc. In essence we are talking about schools which are, wholly or partially, funded by the Government or local authority. I have included some data at the end for independent schools, which should act as a suitable proxy for the 6-7% of the UK pupil population who attend independent schools, however the data here is less detailed than what is provided for state schools.

For England, I have separated out primary and secondary schools. I have also created two maps showing the white British and ethnic minority percentage of total school enrolment by parliamentary constituency, as the Department for Education have provided this information for the first time in the 2025/26 academic release, which is backdated to 2024/25. It’s not possible to provide a parliamentary constituency breakdown for Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, as no breakdowns are provided by the respective Governments or statistical agencies.

For Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, the figures are for total pupil enrolment. This is sometimes referred to as all-sectors and encompasses both primary and secondary schools, as well as any miscellaneous schools like grammar or special schools which recorded ethnicity, though the numbers of pupils outside primary and secondary schools are very small.

I will start with schools in England, as this is where the bulk of demographic change has occurred and will continue to occur in future. The releases covering schools in England are also the most fragmented and hardest to locate, as the names for these statistical bulletins have changed on multiple occasions and many are no longer hosted on the Government website and have been migrated to The National Archives.

All the charts and maps below are interactive Datawrapper charts. I would recommend viewing this article on a PC, as they might not format correctly on a phone or tablet. For links to all the sources used, notes and additional explanations for where this information has been collated from, please see here.

Schools in England

The Department for Education (DfE) publishes schools, pupils and their characteristics releases once a year. This allows you to create a table showing the ethnicity of pupils from the 2015/16 to 2025/26 academic year, which will be referenced as January 2016 and January 2026 going forward, as the school census takes place in January.

White British pupils comprised 69.3% of enrolment in January 2016, falling to 59.7% in January 2026. This figure is for total pupil enrolment (all sectors) though you can break it down into state-funded primary or state-funded secondary if you wish.

The releases page has the earliest release going back to January 2010 (2009/10), which showed white British pupils comprised 73.8% of primary school enrolment and 77.3% of secondary school enrolment. However, starting from 2010 doesn’t tell the full story. The ethnicity of pupils has been recorded as part of the school census since 1996 and The National Archives has releases in digital format that are readable from 1998 onwards. The DfE don’t link any of these archived releases, which makes them harder to track down as the National Archives is poorly indexed and harder to search. When contacted, even the Schools and Pupils Statistics Team were unaware that releases including ethnicity existed before 2002.

I will use the 2003 school census results as the starting point. This is because the 2003 census added a plethora of ethnicity categories to align with the 2001 census, including the introduction of the ‘White British’ category, alongside several mixed ethnicity categories. The ethnicity categories added in the 2003 school census are still used today and remain unchanged over 20 years later. Ethnic minority is defined as all ethnicities excluding ‘White British’ and excluding pupils who don’t have an ethnicity stated. This aligns with how the DfE produce these statistics and the accompanying summaries.

White British pupils comprised 79.5% of enrolment in state-funded primary schools in 2003, decreasing to 70.8% of enrolment in 2013 and 62.6% of enrolment in 2023. As of January 2026, they have declined further to 59.8% of enrolment. Ethnic minority pupils comprised 17.3% of enrolment in state-funded primary schools in 2003, increasing to 28.5% of enrolment in 2013 and 36.1% of enrolment in 2023. As of January 2026, they have increased further to 38.9% of enrolment. Pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated aren’t shown to improve chart readability. They comprised 3.2% of enrolment in 2003, 0.7% of enrolment in 2013 and have increased slightly to 1.3% of enrolment in January 2026.

White British pupils comprised 80.3% of enrolment in state-funded secondary schools in 2003, decreasing to 74.7% of enrolment in 2013 and 62.6% of enrolment in 2023. As of January 2026, they have fallen further to 59.4% of enrolment. Ethnic minority pupils comprised 14.8% of enrolment in state-funded secondary schools in 2003, increasing to 24.2% of enrolment in 2013 and 35.4% of enrolment in 2023. As of January 2026, they have increased further to 38.7% of enrolment. Again, pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated aren’t shown. They comprised 4.9% of enrolment in 2003, 1.1% of enrolment in 2013 and have increased slightly to 1.9% of enrolment in January 2026.

Given that white British births have declined noticeably since 2021 and that most children start primary school at age five, the white British percentage is pretty much guaranteed to fall further in the coming years, even before one factors in the enrolment of children of Boriswave migrants who were born overseas and thus not captured in birth statistics.

The January 2026 school census was the first in which the DfE published ethnicity breakdowns by Parliamentary constituency, rather than just local authority or region, as was the case in previous releases. Below I have created two maps showing the white British and ethnic minority percentage for each constituency using the current 2024 boundaries. These percentages are for total school enrolment and have not been broken down for primary or secondary school pupil enrolment.

Note that constituencies may not sum to 100% if you were to add the white British and ethnic minority percentage together. This is because I have rounded the percentages to 1 decimal place to improve map readability and excluded pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated to align with DfE practice.

The constituency with the highest white British percentage is North Northumberland, where 92.5% of school pupils are white British. The constituency with the lowest white British percentage is East Ham, where 2.3% of school pupils are white British.

The constituency with the highest ethnic minority percentage is East Ham, where 97.1% of school pupils are from an ethnic minority background. The constituency with the lowest ethnic minority percentage is Torridge and Tavistock, where 6.1% of pupils are from an ethnic minority background.

There are 142 constituencies in England where white British pupils made up less than 50% of enrolment, up from 137 the year prior. Percentages have been rounded to 1 decimal place to improve map readability.

Schools in Wales

The Welsh Government publishes annual school census results on their website. The releases cover January 2014 to January 2025, though the January 2014 release contains data from January 2010 onwards. An archive release was found on the StatsWales website covering January 2004 (2003/04) and January 2005 (2004/05), though no census results could be found after these dates to cover the period prior to January 2010. The StatsWales website has since been migrated, and the two older releases are no longer accessible. The Welsh Government school statistics team were contacted to ask if they could produce a single release covering the ethnic background of pupils from 2004 to 2025, covering the number of pupils and percentage of enrolment by ethnic group, which they kindly did. This ad hoc release (Pupils aged 5 or over by ethnic background, 2004 to 2025) can be viewed here.

White British pupils comprised 92% of enrolment in 2004, declining moderately to 90.5% of enrolment in 2014 and 84.1% of enrolment in 2025. The ethnic minority percentage of pupil enrolment has increased from 5.1% in 2004 to 8.9% of enrolment in 2014 and 15.3% of enrolment in 2025. Pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated aren’t shown. They comprised 3% of enrolment in 2004, 0.6% of enrolment in 2014 and 0.7% of enrolment in 2025.

Schools in Scotland

The Scottish Government publishes pupil census supplementary statistics on their website. The releases are labelled as covering 2007 to 2025, though Table 1.12 in the 2007 release has the ethnicity of pupils from 2003 to 2006. It’s possible to separate primary and secondary schools, but as Scotland has seen lower levels of immigration and less demographic change, I didn’t deem it necessary; therefore, the all-sectors figures for total pupil enrolment have been used.

What complicates the Scottish statistics is that the Scottish Government have used three different ethnicity classifications between 2003 and 2025. Scotland also doesn’t use the same ethnicity classifications as England and Wales, making long-term comparisons harder. I have broken down the Scottish releases into three separate charts covering the time periods under which different ethnicity classifications were used. From 2003 to 2010, ethnic minority is defined as all ethnicities, except ‘White - UK’ and excluding pupils whose ethnicity was not known or not disclosed. From 2011 to 2019, ethnic minority is defined as all ethnicities, except ‘White – Scottish’ and excluding pupils whose ethnicity was not known or not disclosed. From 2020 onwards, ethnic minority is defined as all ethnicities, except ‘White – Scottish’ and ‘White – Other British’ and excluding pupils whose ethnicity was not known or not disclosed.

White UK pupils comprised 91.3% of enrolment in 2003, decreasing modestly to 89.7% of enrolment in 2010. The ethnic minority percentage of pupils increased from 4.4% of enrolment in 2003 to 7.8% of enrolment in 2010. Pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated aren’t shown. They comprised 4.3% of enrolment in 2003 and 2.5% of enrolment in 2010.

White Scottish pupils comprised 87.6% of enrolment in 2011, decreasing to 78% of enrolment in 2019. The ethnic minority percentage of pupils increased from 10.6% of enrolment in 2011 to 20% of enrolment in 2019. Pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated aren’t shown. They comprised 1.8% of enrolment in 2011 and 2% of enrolment in 2019.

I suspect many white British pupils who were previously identifying as ‘White UK’ were identifying in the ‘White – Other’ category, as they didn’t identify as being Scottish; over this period, the ‘White – Other’ category increased from 4.8% of enrolment to 9.1% of enrolment. These students, including white British students who chose not to identify as Scottish, are therefore confusingly included in the ‘ethnic minority’ category here, which explains the decrease in that category between 2019 and 2020.

From 2020, Scotland changed ethnicity classifications again, adding both ‘White Scottish’ and ‘White Other British’ categories, which I have combined into ‘White Scottish & British’ for the purpose of these charts. White Scottish & British pupils comprised 83.3% of enrolment in 2020, decreasing to 77.5% of enrolment in 2025. The ethnic minority percentage increased from 14.6% of enrolment in 2020 to 19.9% of enrolment in 2025. Pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated aren’t shown. They comprised 2.1% of enrolment in 2020 and 2.6% of enrolment in 2025.

Schools in Northern Ireland

The Department of Education (DoE) publishes school enrolment statistical bulletins that cover 2005/06 to 2025/26. There is no ethnicity information from the 2023/24 census due to industrial action, so this year has been left blank. These releases allow you to disaggregate school types, however as with Wales and Scotland, the figures for total pupil enrolment have been used. Northern Ireland, much like Wales and Scotland, has experienced much lower levels of immigration and less demographic change as a result.

The mainline Northern Ireland school enrolment statistics do not include the number of pupils who don’t have a stated ethnicity. The number of unclassified pupils is remarkably low in Northern Ireland, consistently below 1,000 a year and sometimes as few as 7, so would not impact headline figures. In the mainline release, ethnic minority is defined as all pupils other than ‘White (excluding Irish Traveller)’.

White pupils comprised 98.3% of enrolment in 2006, declining modestly to 92% of enrolment in 2026. Ethnic minority pupils comprised 1.7% of enrolment in 2006, increasing modestly to 8% of enrolment by 2026.

Independent (private) schools

Independent schools are not mandated to report data on pupil characteristics, such as ethnicity or religion. They are only required to report total enrolment. There are around 650,000 pupils who are educated in independent schools, comprising 6-7% of the total UK pupil population. The best metric available comes from the Independent Schools Council (ISC), who have published ethnicity information as part of their annual school census since 2009. As with Government funded schools, their census also takes place in January. You can find a list of ISC census reports here.

There are some caveats with the publicly available ISC census releases:

• Pupils whose ethnicity isn’t stated are completely excluded. The 2026 ISC census notes that ethnicity was only recorded for 25% of pupils in Scotland, so Scotland is completely excluded. Previous ISC census releases have excluded other regions due to low counts.

• Not every school collects ethnicity data. The 2009 ISC census notes that 74% of schools reported ethnicity data and the 2026 census notes that 85% of schools reported ethnicity data, covering 74% of ISC pupils.

• Not every independent school is a member of the ISC, though according to the ISC themselves, their membership encompasses 85% of the total number of pupils who are educated in independent schools in the UK, so their data will be mostly representative.

• ISC censuses from 2009 to 2014 excluded boarding schools when it came to producing ethnicity figures, whereas all ISC censuses since have included them, provided the boarding school reported ethnicity data. This did not meaningfully change any of the figures or overall trend as you can see by hovering over the 2014 and 2015 results.

The ISC census only offers two ethnic groups in the public releases; these are ‘White British’ and ‘UK minority ethnic’. The latter is sometimes worded as ‘Ethnic minority’ or ‘Minority ethnic’ in some of the ISC census releases. For the purposes of the chart, I have coded them all as ‘Ethnic Minority’.

White British pupils comprised 77.2% of ISC enrolment in 2009, declining to 66.2% of enrolment in 2019, 64.9% of enrolment in 2021 and 57.8% of enrolment in 2026. Ethnic minority pupils comprised 22.8% of ISC enrolment in 2009, increasing to 33.8% of enrolment in 2019, 35.1% of enrolment in 2021 and 42.2% of enrolment in 2026.

There may have been some suspicion that independent schools would be less ethnically diverse; however, ISC census results show the opposite is true. Independent schools, at least those that are members of the ISC and report ethnicity data, are more ethnically diverse than state-funded schools in England, at least at the national level. This is something the ISC even highlight in their recent 2026 census.

‘ISC schools educate a diverse pupil population. Among pupils for whom ethnicity is recorded, 42.2% are from minority ethnic backgrounds, a proportion which has increased substantially over time and is higher than in the state‑funded sector in England.’

The decline of white British pupils has slowed in recent years, declining 0.1 pp between the 2025 and 2026 censuses. The slowdown in the decline is likely due to lower levels of immigration and the introduction of VAT on private school fees, which has led to the number of foreign students at boarding schools falling 10% in a single year.

I suspect that for both state-funded and independent schools, there are high levels of ethnic clustering and segregation, mimicking what we see on the ONS census map, where places like London, Birmingham, Manchester and the surrounding areas are highly ethnically diverse, but where most areas of the country remain majority white British. In September 2025, a study was published which examined ethnic clustering in state funded secondary schools in England between 2010 and 2018. The study notes that many white British pupils attended schools with limited ethnic diversity and that when an area experienced an influx of ethnic minority pupils, there was a drop in white British enrolment. Even in areas where white British pupils were a minority overall, such as Birmingham (where they made up only 25% of the secondary school population) there were individual schools at which white British enrolment approaches 90%. Similar trends were observed in other areas and for other ethnic groups. The study also noted that Asian pupils comprised 25% of London’s secondary school population, yet there were schools where Asian enrolment was 40-50%.

Conclusions

It is all too easy to dismiss population projections that reach decades into the future, and to argue over methodological differences when it comes to assumed levels of net migration and fertility rates. Often, this dynamic reduces conversations surrounding our demographic situation to a futile argument over the precise year in which white Brits will become a minority in our own country. Of course, it does not much matter whether this will occur in 2053, 2061, 2066, or any other year. It will either happen, or it will not.

The more damaging consequence of discussion in these terms is the reinforcement of the idea that demographic replacement is a threat looming in the future, rather than a reality of the present. Not only does that lessen the urgency that many feel, it also shapes the responses. If we understand replacement as something that may occur in the future as a result of immigration, our attempts to prevent it will naturally be centred around changes to immigration policy. But what these figures show is that the disaster has already occurred. Even if we were to put a complete halt to all immigration tomorrow, white Brits will be reduced to at most ~55% of the population as older generations pass away and those currently in their youth replace them. At that level, only a very marginal difference in fertility rates by ethnicity will ensure our minoritisation.

If we wish to ensure that Britain continues to exist in the future, and that the British people are capable of self-determination within a unified political community to which they feel any kind of connection, these figures show beyond any reasonable doubt that we must do more than simply control who is allowed into our country. To galvanise support on that basis, the public must be given an accurate impression of the current situation. The census, helpful as it is, must be seen as a lagging indicator — and those of us who wish to highlight the extent and pace of demographic change in a way which produces the necessary and commensurate political response must focus on metrics which paint a more accurate picture of where we are now.

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This article was written by Charlie Cole, a Pimlico Journal contributor. Have a pitch? Send it to submissions@pimlicojournal.co.uk.

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