David Nicholson-Lord and Philip Bushill-Matthews disagree

Dear Philip,

The idea that we need more people on the earth, whatever the ostensible reason, ought by now to be a self-evident nonsense. The fact that it’s not – that many apparently sane people are suggesting it – is a sign of just how deeply humanity is in denial about the environmental crisis it faces.

The planet’s population is set to grow by 40 per cent, to over 9 billion, by 2050. The UK, one of the world’s most crowded countries, is projected to grow by a sixth – 10 million – over the next six decades. Human population growth is a key factor in every serious environmental problem, from climate change and energy shortages to loss of species and habitats.  Proposing more people in a world with too many is not unlike putting out a fire by pouring on more petrol.

Producing more babies to ‘support’ an ageing population is the economics of the surreal. What happens when the younger people grow older? Do we then ramp up the birthrate even further to maintain the support ratio?  On this logic, human population would have to continue growing ad infinitum – a manifest impossibility. 
There are many sensible ways of adjusting to longer life expectancy without adding to the strain on the planet.

Best wishes,

David

Dear David,

I note your comments about the planet’s population as a whole. Rather than respond on behalf of the entire world, may I be more limited in my response and just talk about Europe, or even just the EU?

The European Union population is currently fairly static overall. In twenty years time, it is projected to have increased by about 10 million before slightly falling back. But even this increase of 10 million disguises a decrease of 20 million people of working age. The increase is only because oldies like me are living longer.

If we want to get a balance in our population in Europe, we need more young people if only to pay the pensions of their parents. This is not ‘the economics of the surreal’ as you quaintly dismiss it. It is absolutely the economics of the real, in which more real pensioners will be living in real hardship unless there are more real young people around to pay real taxes to fund them.

The alternatives are either to have more babies, or to kill off some of us ancients. Otherwise the economics just don’t work. I have personally done my bit about the former, and am not yet willing to volunteer for the latter. How about you?

Best wishes,

Philip

Dear Philip,

Fortunately, we need neither of your solutions. Rising life expectancy is to be welcomed and the answer to such problems as it poses is undramatic and straightforward: a combination of saving more, working a little longer, improving  preventive health so that we stay fit, and enabling the millions of  unemployed or underemployed people in Europe,  many of them victims of ageism,  to get back to work. It is for these reasons that the recent Tomorrow’s Company report on ageing concluded: ‘There is no pensions crisis… we can afford to grow old.’ (See 1 below)

I should explain further about the support ratio – the ratio of working to non-working people. A higher birth rate would initially worsen this (babies need feeding, clothing, educating), then improve it (babies go to work) but ultimately make it much, much worse (babies become pensioners) – so that we would then need even more babies to support the babies people like you are currently advocating. The Oxford demographer David Coleman calculates that to keep the support ratio at current levels would require a UK population in 2100 of 300 million - and rising. He calls it ‘the incredible in pursuit of the implausible’.

Do you seriously think a UK with a population of 300 million – five times the current level – represents the ‘economics of the real’?

Yours curiously,

David

Dear David,

I confess I have not read the report which claims ‘there is no pensions crisis’.  I am not sure on which ivory tower the author sits, but I talk to real pensioners, and real politicians trying to grapple with the issue, who see a real problem that is not going away. It does need solving, and it will not get an easier to solve if we (you) pretend it isn’t there.

You also quote another academic on a different tower, claiming the ‘support ratio’ population in the UK would need to be 300 million. I don’t buy that either. Please descend to my level and talk about the current numbers.

Finally, I note that you represent the Optimum Population Trust. Do tell me: who does the Trust think should decide what the optimum population is? The Trust? Governments? Or dare we let the people decide for themselves?
In China, the answer appears to be the State Government decides, limiting births to one child per family – with some parents killing off unwanted baby girls so they can use their ration for one son. Is this the future? In the UK many young women would love to have more children – simply because they want to be mothers – yet job pressures prevent them. Is this the future?

Yours, even more curiously,

Philip

Dear Philip,

I’m sorry you’re so dismissive of factual evidence.  I don’t think the conclusions of Oxford University’s (very real) professor of demography or of the group of (equally real) businesspeople, economists and actuaries who produced the Tomorrow’s World (a business think-tank) report should be quite so airily rubbished.  Never mind – what about The Economist  magazine, which on January 5 told us to stop worrying about demographic ‘bogeys’ and  concluded that ageing and shrinking populations were ‘something to celebrate’? Or the Pensions Commission itself, which has said more births are not the answer to an ageing population?

By ignoring such evidence (and there’s much more), you’re in danger of falling victim to myth-mongering. Panic breeding programmes are not an option – unless you’re happy to bequeath a world so overpopulated as to put human survival at stake.

You ask about ‘optimum’ population figures.  These are based on research linking human numbers to environmental carrying capacity – surely the key to sustainability. And the people of Europe have indeed ‘decided for themselves’ – in favour of smaller populations. It’s people like you who are telling them to produce more babies! As for China, of course coercion is wrong. But at least China’s leaders have recognised the dangers posed by population growth. Isn’t it time ours (for example, you) did the same?

Yours less than optimistically,

David

Dear David,

You state that the people of Europe ‘have decided for themselves’ in favour of smaller populations. I disagree profoundly.

Many have only chosen to limit their families because they feel they had no choice. They wish to have more kids, but are not prepared to bring them into a world where they have limited time – and money – to give them a decent life. The key question was the one I raised in my previous message: Who decides?
It should not be for politicians – or theoreticians – to decide how many children people should have. It should be for parents to decide, and to decide freely.

It is not for us to ‘tell them to have more babies’. It is for us to enable them to have more if that is their wish. At present they cannot, because the pressures of life are frankly stacked against them.

If politicians, business leaders and others, can help create a better work-life balance by promoting more flexibility in the work-place, then women can be freed to make a different decision. They can decide to bring more children into this world, which will not just benefit themselves but also benefit society.

Who decides? Let them decide – and let us make it easier for them, by getting out of the way.

Yours finally,

Philip

Reference

1. The Ageing Population, Pensions and Wealth Creation, a Tomorrow's Company study,2005, Tomorrow's Company, 235 -241 Blackfriars Rd, London SE1 8NW. Website

David Nicholson-Lord is an environmental writer and research associate for the Optimum Population Trust. He lectures in environment at the City University, London, and was formerly with the Times, the Independent and the Independent on Sunday, where he was environment editor.

Philip Bushill-Matthews is Conservative MEP for the West Midlands, and Conservative Spokesman on Employment and Social Affairs in the Employment Committee in the European Parliament