Falling birth rate in Jersey a 'ticking bomb'

BBC News

a day ago

Jersey's falling birth rate is a "ticking bomb" for the island, the housing minister says.Deputy Sam Mézec said the declining rate, combined with an ageing population, posed a huge challenge.His comments come after a Policy Centre Jersey report based on data from the Superintendent Registrar showed the number of births in Jersey between 2021 and 2024 fell by 20% compared to a 5% drop in England and Wales.The birth rate in the first half of 2025 was 4% lower than the first half of 2024, figures also showed.
Mézec said difficulty finding the right home was putting young families off having children in Jersey, and he had friends who "moved away from Jersey so they can afford to have children".He said: "They just can't find the kind of home they want to bring their children up in, a place with enough bedrooms, outdoor space, and over the last few decades that has become more and more unaffordable in Jersey.""We will have problems if we don't have a large enough working population providing the services and paying the taxes supporting the young and the retired.""We need to be planning now for policies that start to reverse that trend, and that means supporting younger people into family-sized homes."
Smaller communities 'vulnerable'
He added: "What's our working demographic going to look like in 20 or 30 years if we don't have enough young people going through our education system and going into work when they reach adulthood to provide the services that supports the whole of society including the ageing population?"This could be a ticking bomb if we don't get this right."Mark Boleat, a senior advisor at the Policy Centre Jersey, said it was concerning the local birth rate was falling faster than other places.The centre's report found the number of babies born in Jersey in 2024 had fallen by 10% compared to the year before, and the number of primary school pupils had fallen by 5.6% in the last two years.Mr Boleat said smaller communities such as Jersey were more vulnerable to falling rates.He said: "In a big country, it can fall but it doesn't have quite the effect. In Jersey, the fall... over the last few years is already having a very significant effect."So, over the last couple of years in England, the number of births has fallen 5%. In Jersey, it's fallen by 20%. We need to understand why."
Parents told the BBC the cost of living made raising children very difficult.Bobby Yordanov is 33 and has a son, but said the cost of living was making him reconsider having more children.He said: "I love Jersey, but most likely if we have another child we are going to move because it's going to be unbearable."The cost of raising children here is one of the main reasons the birth rate is so low. There is absolutely no other reason and it's getting ridiculously expensive."In a couple, one of your salaries just covers nursery."Abdul Bassit, 43, has two children and said his biggest costs were clothing and food, which cost "more and more everyday".
However, environmentalist Nigel Jones argued the declining birth rate locally was not bad.He said: "We all know that, worldwide, the biggest predictor of a lower birth rate is the level of education of the population. "The more educated young women are, the fewer children they are likely to have, and I don't see that as a problem at all."There are plenty of children being born all over the world - it's not like we have shortage worldwide. "We need to be less insular on this and we need to think, if work needs doing in the future, there will be people who can come to Jersey and do it."