Births Increase for the Fifth Consecutive Year

More than 57,000 births were registered in 2007 - the highest number in Scotland since 1997, and an increase of more than two thousand compared to 2006, the Registrar General announced today.

The Registrar General was commenting following his publication of the 2007 Preliminary Return which provides provisional figures for births, deaths and marriages registered during 2007.

Provisional figures for 2007 show a continued increase in the number of births and a slight increase in the number of deaths.

Duncan Macniven, Registrar General for Scotland, said:

“There were 2,091 more births in 2007 than in 2006. The 57,781 total for the year was the highest since 1997. This is the fifth annual increase in a row.

“Cancer, which accounted for 27 per cent of deaths, coronary heart disease (17 per cent) and strokes (10 per cent) remain the three biggest causes of death. The number of deaths from coronary heart disease and strokes dropped by two per cent on 2006, with almost 350 fewer people dying. On the other hand, 142 more people died from cancer, an increase of almost one per cent.”

There were 29,866 marriages – just 32 fewer than in 2006 and the fifth-lowest since Victorian times (1997 was lowest with 29,691).

688 civil partnerships (339 male and 349 female) were registered during 2007. This is considerably lower than the 1,047 registered in 2006 which was the first full year in which the Civil Partnership Act 2004 was in force.

Divorces fell by 321, to 12,693 – a drop of 2.5 per cent. This is not unexpected as there was a sharp increase in divorces in 2006 because of the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006 which came into effect on 4 May 2006. The Act reduced separation periods for divorce with consent to one year (previously two years) and without consent to two years (previously five years).

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