The latest population figures produced by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) on 28 June 2018 show that an estimated 534,800 people live in Bradford District – an increase of 2,300 people (0.4%) since the previous year.

Bradford District is the fifth largest metropolitan district (in terms of population) in England, after Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield and Manchester although the District’s population growth is lower than other major cities.

The increase in the District’s population is largely due to “natural change”- there have been around 3,300 more births than deaths, although this has been balanced by a larger number of people leaving Bradford to live in other parts of the UK than coming to live here and a lower number of international migrants. In 2016/17 the net internal migration was -2,700 and the net international migration was 1,700.

A large proportion of Bradford’s population is dominated by the younger age groups. More than one-quarter (29%) of the District’s population is aged less than 20 and nearly seven in ten people are aged less than 50. Bradford has the highest percentage of the under 16 population in England after the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, Slough Borough Council and Luton Borough Council.

The population of Bradford is ethnically diverse. The largest proportion of the district’s population (63.9%) identifies themselves as White British. The district has the largest proportion of people of Pakistani ethnic origin (20.3%) in England.

The largest religious group in Bradford is Christian (45.9% of the population). Nearly one quarter of the population (24.7%) are Muslim. Just over one fifth of the district’s population (20.7%) stated that they had no religion.

There are 216,813 households in the Bradford district. Most households own their own home (29.3% outright and 35.7% with a mortgage). The percentage of privately rented households is 18.1%. 29.6% of households were single person households.

Information from the Annual Population Survey in December 2017 found that Bradford has 228,100 people aged 16-64 in employment. At 68% this is significantly lower than the national rate (74.9%). 91,100 (around 1 in 3 people) aged 16-64, are not in work. The claimant count rate is 2.9% which is higher than the regional and national averages.

Skill levels are improving with 26.5% of 16 to 74 year olds educated to degree level. 18% of the district’s employed residents work in retail/wholesale. The percentage of people working in manufacturing has continued to decrease from 13.4% in 2009 to 11.9% in 2016. This is still higher than the average for Great Britain (8.1%).

This interview is part of the Women, Risk and Aids Project (1989-90) archive which was created as part of the Reanimating Data Project (2018-20).Anonymised transcript of an interview with Anita. She is from a Muslim family, and though her parents are fairly liberal and westernised, they've been much stricter with her than with her older sister. Anita is allowed to date at the moment, but her partner would also have to be Muslim - she isn't too concerned about relationships right now. She has mixed feelings around having an arranged marriage in the future and wouldn't to do it for the sake of it. Anita is worried about sexual experiences before marriage, as there are particular customs in Muslim culture around virginity that she would need to adhere to. She has some interesting thoughts on the ways that pleasure, marriage and religion intersect, and the expectations that are placed on Muslim wives. Sex education at her secondary school wasn't taken too seriously by Anita, as she could never imagine being old enough to need that sort of information. She would have liked to have been taught about the emotional aspects of relationships too. Anita isn't sure what she would like to do in the future, but doesn't want marriage or children until much later on.