Warnings that London secondary schools may soon be forced to close due to falling pupil numbers are the latest visible consequence of a much deeper demographic problem. While policymakers routinely point to housing costs, economic insecurity, and delayed parenthood, one central factor remains persistently under-examined: the long-term impact of abortion on Britain’s birth rate.
London Councils have warned that demand for Year 7 places is now falling faster than demand for Reception places for the first time on record. Over the next four years, pupil numbers entering secondary schools in the capital are expected to drop by almost four percent, with inner London facing even sharper declines. Because schools are funded per pupil, the result is likely to be mergers, closures, staff reductions, and a narrowing of curriculum options.
This is not a sudden crisis. The UK’s Total Fertility Rate has been below the replacement level of 2.1 since 1973. What is new is the speed at which the consequences are now becoming unavoidable. In 2023, excluding the coronavirus anomaly, deaths outnumbered births for the first time in decades. Immigration has masked this decline for years, but it has not solved it.
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Crucially, the conversation around falling fertility almost never addresses abortion, despite the data being unambiguous. Office for National Statistics figures show that the gap between the number of live births required for population replacement and the number actually occurring has, for much of the past fifty years, been smaller than the number of abortions carried out annually.
In 2023, around 30 percent of all viable pregnancies in the UK ended in abortion; this figure is higher in London. Ten years ago, the figure was closer to 20 percent. Today, for every twenty viable pregnancies, fourteen result in live births and six in abortion.
This reality matters when considering school closures. Children who are never born do not fill classrooms, sustain local services, or become the future workforce needed to support an ageing population. When schools close, communities hollow out. When communities hollow out, families are less likely to form. The cycle accelerates.
SPUC’s Executive Director, Michael Robinson, says, “If the closure of schools is treated merely as a funding or planning problem, the response will be utterly benign. It is the visible end point of decades of decisions that have devalued childbirth, normalized abortion, and treated population decline as a net benefit for the world. London’s empty classrooms should be a wake-up call. A society that does not welcome children will eventually reap the consequences: wrecked economies and communities. Abortion is the greatest destroyer of societal harmony and prosperity.”
LifeNews Note: Courtesy of SPUC. The Society for the Protection of Unborn Children is a leading pro-life organization in the United Kingdom.
