Elizabeth McLaren
Vital Statistics Outputs Branch
Telephone: +44 (0)1329 444110
Categories: Population, Births and Fertility, Live Births and Stillbirths, Conception and Fertility Rates
Frequency of release: Annually
Language: English
Geographical coverage: England and Wales
Geographical breakdown: Local Authority
The tables contain data for numbers of live births, fertility rates, percentage of births outside marriage/civil partnership, sex ratio, mean age of mother, area of usual residence of mother and country of birth of mother.
Births data before 2008 are available in the annual publication Birth statistics, England and Wales (Series FM1). The data years available include 1998 to 2008.
For information on data quality, legislation and procedures relating to birth statistics, please see Births metadata (332.6 Kb Pdf) and Quality and methodology information for birth statistics (257.9 Kb Pdf) .
We have published an article on Trends in births and deaths over the last century.
There is an interactive mapping tool which enables trends in fertility to be analysed at the local level.
The Vital statistics: population and health reference tables provide annual births data for the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom Statistics Authority has designated these statistics as National Statistics, in accordance with the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 and signifying compliance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.
Designation can be broadly interpreted to mean that the statistics:
Once statistics have been designated as National Statistics it is a statutory requirement that the Code of Practice shall continue to be observed.