The UK’s Demographic Future

Lord Hacking Excerpts

Thursday 11th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hacking (Lab)]

My Lords, with apologies for not putting my name down earlier, I would like to make a small contribution in the gap.

I have two reasons for wanting to make this contribution. First, I want to pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, in this, his valedictory debate. We all are sad at the departure from this House of the noble Lord, but we have the benefit, as the noble Baroness, Lady Buscombe, pointed out, of him kindly leaving behind his wife. We will therefore continue to have the benefit of the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson of Abinger. My second reason for wanting to take part in this debate was that in my maiden speech in this House, when I was a very young man 53 years ago, the subject of the debate was the need for a UK population policy. I have to say that the impact of that debate, despite my speech, has been negligible.

We have the evidence of that in the foreword to this excellent report. In 1971 the population of the United Kingdom was 55.9 million, but in the last 25 years there has been a rise of 9.2 million. In that debate, the argument was put forward that responsible parents had no more than 2.5 children. It rather puzzled me how responsible parents could produce 0.5 of a child. This then became a matter of personal embarrassment to me because my wife gave birth to our third child, so I was 0.5 irresponsible according to the view in the debate.

On this very important subject, we must not sit on our hands. The rise in population, causing strain on vital components in our society—the National Health Service, housing and demographic balance—is terribly threatening. There has been too much social unrest, particularly arising out of immigration.

This is a brief intervention, and I hope the Whips are noticing that I am keeping to the promise of four minutes. Indeed, it has been only three at the moment—I am glad to see my noble friend nodding acknowledgment of my achievement. This vital question was at the very end of the conclusion of this report: we must

“ask why, as a country, we did not have the determination to look forward and adopt policies that more directly addressed the concerns of the settled population of the country whose general welfare must surely be the primary objective of any government”.

I endorse those words, and I am under four minutes.