Reading

Ethnic composition trajectory

Census 2011 and 2021 observed, Hamilton-Perry projections to 2061. Shaded band shows 80% confidence interval for White British share.

What’s driving change

Shift-share splits the change in White British share into national trend, age structure, and local factors. Dominant driver: local migration.

Diversity index

Religion

Census 2021 religious composition with projections to 2051.

Muslim population projected: 14.0% by 2051

Country of birth

UK-born vs foreign-born share, with projection to 2051.

English proficiency

Census 2021

ONS Census 2021 (TS029) via NOMIS. Reference date 21 March 2021.

Projection

NHS and council services will need increased interpreter/translation provision.

Service demand pressure

New arrivals (NINo registrations)

Adults from overseas registering for a National Insurance number, rolling year ending Oct-25 to Dec-25. Reading ranks at the 85th percentile nationally for total NINo registrations.

DWP National Insurance number allocations to adult overseas nationals (Stat-Xplore NINO database).. NINo registrations measure new arrivals into the National Insurance system, not total foreign-born population. A NINo is allocated when an overseas national requests one, usually to start work or claim benefits, so the figure misses students and dependants who never enter the labour market. Small (LA × nationality) cells are suppressed by Stat-Xplore for disclosure control.

Arrivals over the last 24 years

Annual NINo registrations to adults from overseas in Reading from 2002 to 2025, alongside the UK total for context. The peak year was 2022 (6,446 registrations). Total over the full period: 90,201 registrations.

DWP Stat-Xplore, NINO Registrations to Adult Overseas Nationals Entering the UK (Ninos cube), aggregated per calendar year by summing the four constituent quarters. Geography: ONS LA codes. Counts are NEW NINo registrations per calendar year. A NINo is issued once per person at the point of first work or claim, so this is a flow measure, not a stock. People who arrive but never register (some students, dependants, retirees) are excluded. Late registrations show in a later year than the year of arrival. Pre-2010 figures used a different administrative system; series is comparable but small methodological revisions to the early years are possible.

Who is arriving

Age and sex profile of 3,152 NINo registrations to adults from overseas in Reading in 2025. National comparison shown alongside.

DWP Stat-Xplore Ninos cube, LA × Age band × Sex, rolling year ending Q4 2025 (Jan-Dec 2025 calendar year). Counts are NEW NINo registrations to adult overseas nationals. Age is age at NINo registration, not age at arrival. The registration may follow arrival by months. 'Less than 18' is rare in this dataset because the published Ninos series is filtered to adult overseas nationals; values reflect young workers/claimants close to 18. 'Unknown' age is a small residual.

Why people are coming

For each of the top arriving nationalities in Reading, this is the national mix of visa routes used in 2025. It shows whether arrivals from that country are typically students, workers, on family routes (including refugee family reunion), or in some other category. Local-authority breakdowns of visa routes are not published, so we apply the national mix at nationality level.

Home Office, Immigration system statistics, year ending March 2026 (released 21 May 2026); Vis_D02 (Entry clearance visa outcomes by nationality, visa type, and outcome). Joined with DWP Stat-Xplore NINo registrations rolling year ending Q4 2025. Visa grants are issued at the point of entry-clearance application and are NOT the same population as NINo registrations. Visitor visas (2.24 million in 2025) do not lead to NINo and are excluded from the route-mix percentages so the Work / Study / Family / Other proportions are interpretable. Humanitarian routes (BN(O), Ukraine schemes, Resettlement, Asylum) are surfaced as national totals only because the same nationality split is not provided in this dataset. EU/EEA nationals largely fall outside entry-clearance for short stays, so their NINo flow is materially understated by visa data alone.

How Reading changed: 2011 to 2021

Two snapshots from two consecutive Censuses, ten years apart. Population changed from 155,698 in 2011 to 174,221 in 2021 (+11.9%). Non-UK-born residents went from 38,620 (24.8% of population) to 58,327 (33.5%).

Source: ONS Census 2011 KS204EW (NOMIS NM_611_1) and Census 2021 TS012 (NOMIS NM_2032_1), aligned to broad country-of-birth groups. 2011 data uses 2011 LA boundaries; 2021 data uses 2023 boundaries. LAs whose ONS code changed between Censuses (Buckinghamshire, Northamptonshire, North Yorkshire, Somerset reorganisations) are not in this comparison.

Schools, first language

Across 73 state-funded schools in Reading (27,972 pupils, 2024/25), 37.3% have a first language other than English.

Source: DfE Schools, Pupils and their Characteristics 2024/25, school-level data aggregated to district. EAL (English as Additional Language) is a household-level signal: children born in the UK to non-English-speaking households count as EAL.

South East labour market

Payrolled employments in the South East region (December 2024). Provides Reading with regional context. Local-authority RTI is not published; the region is the smallest geography for HMRC's nationality breakdown.

Source: HMRC Real Time Information via ONS, payrolled employments by region and industrial sector, July 2014 to December 2024. Counts are employments not employees; suppressed cells appear as missing.

Crime

Police-recorded crime rates per 1,000 population, Year ending March 2024. Reading ranks at the 78th percentile nationally for total crime rate.

ONS recorded crime by Community Safety Partnership area, year ending March 2024 (Home Office police recorded crime). LA-level rates are CSP rates inherited where multiple LAs share a CSP.. Police recorded crime is shaped by recording practice, reporting rates, and policing priority. Cross-area comparison must take account of those factors. Hate crime and quality-of-life detail are not in this file.

Adult social care

Council ASC spend, residential placements, and quality-of-life outcomes, 2023-24. Spend per head sits at the 25th percentile nationally.

NHS Digital ASCFR & SALT data tables 2023-24 (CASSR-level). Quality-of-life and DToC fields omitted (DToC discontinued post-COVID; ASCOF measures live in a separate publication).. ASC sits with upper-tier authorities only (counties, unitaries, London boroughs, mets); ~153 LAs in coverage and districts are not present. Spending is shaped by demographic composition, deprivation, and informal-care availability and direct cross-area comparison must control for those.

Health by ethnic group

Share reporting "not good health" in each of Reading's largest ethnic groups, Census 2021.

ONS Census 2021 (RM043 - General health by ethnic group by age) via NOMIS. All ages, no age-standardisation: younger ethnic-group populations will show lower rates partly because they're younger, not necessarily because they're healthier. Group labels shortened for display.

Special educational needs

EHCPs and primary need breakdown, 2024-25 academic year. 5-year EHCP growth at the 52th percentile nationally.

DfE Special educational needs in England, academic year 2024/25 (sen_phase_type_.csv + sen_secondary_need_.csv).. EHCP responsibility sits with upper-tier authorities only, ~153 LAs in coverage. Rate-per-10k uses total LA population (Census 2021) as denominator since school-age population is not in the ethnic-projections feed; cross-LA comparison is therefore directional rather than absolute. Rising EHCP counts may reflect improved identification, changes in diagnostic criteria, increased parental awareness, or genuine prevalence change.

How NHS care for overseas residents is funded (national context)

Most non-UK residents in Reading pay for NHS care up-front through the Immigration Health Surcharge (IHS), which is added to most visa applications. Asylum seekers, refugees, ILR holders and Irish citizens are exempt. Visitors and undocumented residents are charged at 150% of the national NHS tariff. The figures below are England + Wales national totals; per-LA NHS cost-recovery is not centrally published.

Sources: NHS (Charges to Overseas Visitors) Regulations 2015 (as amended); Home Office IHS caseworker guidance (Sept 2025); House of Commons Library briefing CBP-7274; NHS England NHS Payment Scheme (national tariff). Approximately 80% of identified overseas-visitor debt across all NHS treatment is uncollected (NAO, follow-up scrutiny).

Economic profile

Housing

Composition today

How dwellings in Reading are occupied. Single-person households and houses in multiple occupation are the two cleanest signals.

Sources: MHCLG Council Taxbase 2024 (CTB1, snapshot 7 October 2024) for single-person discount; ONS Census 2021 RM192 for HMO dwellings. HMO Census numbers reflect dwellings classified as HMO on Census Day; current licensing registers held by individual councils are not centrally published.

Tenure by ethnic group

Household ownership rates for Reading's largest ethnic groups, Census 2021.

ONS Census 2021 (RM134 - Tenure by ethnic group, Household Reference Persons) via NOMIS. Group labels shortened for display.

Tenure projection

Census 2021 tenure patterns by ethnicity, projected to 2041 from demographic composition change.

High foreign-born population growth will drive additional housing demand, particularly in the private rented sector.

School demographics

DfE School Census 2024/25. 23,990 pupils.

Schools are 22pp more diverse than the general population (schools show the future).

Westminster constituencies

Parliamentary constituencies overlapping Reading, sorted by share of LA postcodes the constituency covers.