“London went from 86% white to 36% in ten years.”
Viral posts across social platforms.
Verdict: False
The record
London was 54% white in 2021. It was never 86%.
At the 2021 census, 53.8% of Londoners identified as white: 36.8% White British and 17% White Other. Ten years earlier the figure was 59.8%.
The 86% never existed. London was 79.8% white in 1991 and 71.2% in 2001, a change spread over thirty years rather than ten. And the 36% is the White British figure on its own, quoted as though it were the whole white population. Both ends of the comparison have been swapped for something else.
- 2021
- 53.8% white (36.8% White British + 17% White Other)
- The “86%”
- invented. It was 79.8% in 1991 and 71.2% in 2001
- The trick
- one sub-group quoted as the whole
