THE higher average age of Christians in England and Wales means that Christians are more likely to own their homes outright, but are in poorer health than all other named religions and also the overall population, new statistics from the 2021 Census show.
The new data, released on Friday by the Office for National Statistics, are based on the profiles of people who answered the voluntary question on religious identity in the 2021 Census (News, 2 December 2022).
People who identified as Christian in England and Wales were more likely to own a house outright than those of any other religion: 36 per cent (compared with 27 per cent of the whole population). This group had an average age of 51, compared with 40 for the overall population (News, 3 February), “suggesting that they may have had time to pay off a mortgage or loan”, the analysis says.
Combined with the 33 per cent of Christians who owned a home with a mortgage, loan, or shared ownership, this means that more than two-thirds (69 per cent) of Christians owned their home. This was compared with 63 per cent of the whole population. Only Sikhs had a higher combined percentage: 78 per cent.
Muslims, who had the youngest average age (27), were the least likely to own a house outright (16 per cent), and also the least likely to own a house with a mortgage, loan, or shared ownership (30 per cent). This was compared with Buddhists (22 per cent; 35 per cent), Hindus (20 per cent; 48 per cent), Jews (31 per cent; 40 per cent), and Sikhs (28 per cent; 50 per cent), and people of other religions (21 per cent; 31 per cent) or no religion (19 per cent; 40 per cent).
People of no religion had the second youngest average age (32).
More than one quarter of the 3.9 million people who identified as Muslim lived in social rented homes, compared with about 16 per cent of the whole population. This was compared with 20.7 per cent of people of other religions, 18.7 per cent of people who identified as having no religion, and 14.2 per cent of Christians.
Muslims were nearly four times more likely to live in overcrowded homes than the overall population of England and Wales. About one third of people who identified as Muslim (32.7 per cent) lived in high-occupancy, low-bedroom housing, compared with 8.4 per cent of the general population. People who identified as Jewish (6.7 per cent), Christian (6.2 per cent), and of no religion (6.2 per cent) were the least likely to live in crowded accommodation.
Christians were the least healthy among the named religions: 6.2 per cent reported “bad” or “very bad” health compared with a range of 3.5 to 5.1 per cent of other named religions, and 5.2 per cent of the whole population. More than 10 per cent of people under “other” (unnamed) religions had bad or very bad health. In previous Census reports on health by age, sex, and deprivation, older people were more likely to report worse health. Therefore, the latest report says, “Those who identified as Christian had an older age profile and reported poorer health than the overall population.”
This was not, however, a universal finding. People of other (unnamed) religions had a smaller proportion of people aged 65 and over (11.8 per cent) when compared with the overall population (18.6 per cent); yet the health of this group was almost twice as poor as the overall population.
Christians and people of other (unnamed) religions were more likely to have a disability than all other named religions and also the overall population.
Almost one third of people of other (unnamed) religions (31.8 per cent) were disabled, of whom 13.9 per cent were “limited a lot” in their daily activities, compared with 17.5 per cent of the overall population, of whom 7.5 per cent were “limited a lot”.
Almost 20 per cent of Christians were disabled, 8.8 per cent of whom were “limited a lot”. Hindus had the lowest prevalence of disability and the highest percentages of good health.
Women were more likely to report “bad health” than men in all the religious groups (4.4 per cent compared with 3.7 per cent). The exception was Buddhists (3.6 per cent of women reported bad health, compared with 4.3 per cent of men).
People of other (unnamed) religions also had the highest percentage of unpaid carers among them (14.5 per cent), of whom 4.2 per cent cared for 50 hours or more per week. This was followed by Christians (ten per cent), of whom 3.2 per cent cared for 50 hours or more per week.
This was compared with 8.8 per cent of the population, of whom 2.7 per cent cared for 50 hours or more. People in the latter category were most likely to be aged 55 to 59 (16.9 per cent). Muslims, however, with a younger age profile, had a comparatively high percentage of unpaid carers, even though the percentage (7.2) was the second lowest across the religious groups.
Employment and qualifications were also analysed. Muslims reported the highest rates of unemployment, and were most likely to report being a student (13.8 per cent), looking after family or home (16.1 per cent), being long-term sick or disabled (4.2 per cent), retired (0.8 per cent), or another reason (7.1 per cent). For Christians, these figures ranged consecutively from 5.4 to 3.2 per cent.