Deanery Magazine 1933

THE FALLING BIRTH RATE

FOR years the birth rate in England has steadily fallen, until it is now the lowest in the world, except Sweden. All this time the population has increased because better conditions and improved knowledge of the laws of health have. decreased the death rate faster than the birth rate. In particular, infant mortality has been about halved.

But this cannot go on for ever. Each year the average age of the population advances, and the time must come soon when the death rate will begin to rise because so many old people are reaching the age when they must die.

Already we are beginning to feel the absence of children. There are roads with houses

occupied by young married people, nearly all of whom have cars but no prams. Rural schools are being closed for lack of pupils, fewer teachers are being trained because unemployment is becoming a danger in the teaching profession, and our Sunday Schools are feeling the pinch.

We must not hastily condemn married people for being selfish. Very often they have

good reasons for desiring small families. No one wants to go back to the old days when a mother had ten children and buried five. The care for human life which marks our time makes people reluctant to have children whom they cannot look after properly. Emigration. has stopped, perhaps never to be revived again in Its old form, and it is natural to ask, what opening is there for young people nowadays in this overcrowded island? I do not think this is the time for a campaign in favour of larger families, but it will soon come.

Ten years hence I believe we shall see a great change. Public opinion will be fully alive

to the danger of a falling population which would mean the passing of England's greatness. The prospect of a country consisting predominantly of old people will seem dull and dreary and motherhood will become fashionable. The young mother with a baby will be envied by other women and her lot will seem happier than that of her sisters who spend their time in amusement; Legislation will more and more favour families rather than individuals. The situation I think, is serious but by no means desperate.

W. K. LOWTHER CLARKE