‘‘‘Reverse’ in region’s demographic trends have sparked warnings about impact on healthcare and funding of public services
The question Gareth Hetherington often gets asked is whether artificial intelligence (AI) will take away people’s jobs.
Since the emergence of figures suggesting Northern Ireland’s population is about to peak, the economist says the bigger worry is a projected drop in the 18-65 working age population.
“When I look at the demographic data, the question I ask is: ‘Will AI come quickly enough to take the jobs that we don’t have people to do?’” adds Hetherington, director of Ulster University’s economic policy centre.
“What that means for the working age population is the need to embrace AI and become more AI literate.” Falling birth rates, people living longer and migration changes are among the factors driving the latest projections by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (Nisra).
Pensioners will outnumber the number of children living in Northern Ireland by next year, according to statisticians. Deaths are projected to exceed the number of births by mid-2030 – one year earlier than previously calculated.
The population is to peak at 1.94 million by 2031 before it starts to fall, dropping to 1.91 million by 2049.
Concerns about the “reverse” in the North’s demographic trends have sparked warnings about the impact on healthcare and funding of public services.
“If they don’t start planning for this, then there’s going to be an even bigger crisis in our public services, particularly schools and health services before the end of the decade,” says the former head of the Northern Ireland civil service, David Sterling.
Recent reports have consistently shown that the North is the “fastest ageing part of the UK”, he says.
Spiralling waiting lists, workforce shortages – particularly in nursing – and access to GP services are among the challenges that have dogged the North’s health service for more than a decade.
The question Gareth Hetherington often gets asked is whether artificial intelligence (AI) will take away people’s jobs.
Since the emergence of figures suggesting Northern Ireland’s population is about to peak, the economist says the bigger worry is a projected drop in the 18-65 working age population.
“When I look at the demographic data, the question I ask is: ‘Will AI come quickly enough to take the jobs that we don’t have people to do?’” adds Hetherington, director of Ulster University’s economic policy centre.
“What that means for the working age population is the need to embrace AI and become more AI literate.”
Falling birth rates, people living longer and migration changes are among the factors driving the latest projections by the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (Nisra).
Pensioners will outnumber the number of children living in Northern Ireland by next year, according to statisticians.
Deaths are projected to exceed the number of births by mid-2030 – one year earlier than previously calculated.
The population is to peak at 1.94 million by 2031 before it starts to fall, dropping to 1.91 million by 2049.
Concerns about the “reverse” in the North’s demographic trends have sparked warnings about the impact on healthcare and funding of public services.
“If they don’t start planning for this, then there’s going to be an even bigger crisis in our public services, particularly schools and health services before the end of the decade,” says the former head of the Northern Ireland civil service, David Sterling.
Recent reports have consistently shown that the North is the “fastest ageing part of the UK”, he says.
Spiralling waiting lists, workforce shortages – particularly in nursing – and access to GP services are among the challenges that have dogged the North’s health service for more than a decade.
“As you get older you have more co-morbidities, you have all sorts of health issues, you also require more at-home care, social care or more frequent visits to hospital,” says Ian Shuttleworth, professor of population and migration studies at Queen’s University Belfast’s school of natural and built environment.
“The obvious thing that’s going to happen with an ageing population is increasing pressure on health services and social care more widely.
“This is actually happening now on top of a funding crisis where Northern Ireland can’t even seem to run itself with the current UK funding level – so where it’s going to be in 20 years’ time, I would hesitate to think.” Over the next 25 years, the over-65 population is projected to grow by 44.7 per cent; the over-85s will more than double.
The demographic shift means “we need more money” by “either increasing taxes or faster economic growth”, according to Shuttleworth.
“Or it means we need to find other ways to deliver social care and healthcare.” Research on social isolation facing older people in more rural communities is soon to be published by Queen’s.
About 5 per cent of pensioners live alone in the North, which equates to just under 95,000 people. They are predominantly women.
Cuts to community support groups and limited public transport are among the challenges facing elderly vulnerable people living alone, some of whom have life limiting illnesses, according to the study.
Connectedness is one of the most critical factors in preserving the health and quality of life of older people; it’s all those services – their social groups, the networks – that have been cut,” says lead Queen’s researcher Estelle Lowry, a health geographer.
Transport was an issue that “kept coming up time and time again” in their focus groups. Almost half of pensioners living alone did not have access to their own car and were reliant on public transport.
“I think transport problems were compounded by the health and social care challenges,” Lowry adds. Plummeting birth rates are not unique to Northern Ireland; it’s happening “all over the world” with women having fewer children and later in life, says Shuttleworth. Traditional high-birth counties such as Italy and Spain now have some of the lowest fertility rates in Europe.
Stormont’s Department of Education has already warned that a drop in pupil numbers could lead to school closures over the next decade. Such decisions will be “politically difficult”, according to Hetherington. We’ve gone through many years of a growing, younger age population; therefore the school estate had to grow to reflect that,” he says. “That’s in reverse now.
“Obviously closing schools will be unpopular, particularly in smaller rural communities but increasingly those schools are going to be unsustainable and will need to be closed.” Pension contributions among the under-40s may also need to increase in order to fund services.
The other option for the North’s younger workforce is to “work longer”, says Hetherington.
“We are going to be in a situation where significantly more people are drawing the pension and we’re going to have less people working and paying taxes to fund those pensions.”
Relatively high levels of immigration in recent years are projected to fall in the North while “significant population growth” is projected in the Republic, Nisra notes.
The potential growing divergence between populations either side of the Border could lead to “very different social care and healthcare conditions moving forward”, according to Shuttleworth.
The Queen’s academic grew up in Barnetby-le-Wold, a village in Lincolnshire in England, and moved to Belfast in 1990.
“My dad was alive until last year. He was 97. I used to go over quite a lot to see him. I know if I wanted to get a doctor for him, I could ring up and he could get a phone call the same day.” Shuttleworth has spent four years on the waiting list for a knee replacement after breaking his leg and has to use a wheelchair for long distances; there is a six-month waiting list for the operation in England.
“The urgent waiting list was three years,” he says, referring to Northern Ireland.
If the North’s working age population shrinks in coming decades, there will be a need for increased migration to address the healthcare workforce shortage, argues Hetherington.
“For family reasons, I’ve had to make many hospital visits over the past few years and it’s apparent very quickly how reliant Northern Ireland’s health service is on migrant labour,” he says.
“My personal opinion is if the economic costs of constraining migration become more apparent, public attitudes to migration may change and we see higher levels of migration than projected.”
Stormont decision makers need to “shift” their focus, says Shuttleworth.
He criticises the “localism” in the North’s politics.
Political rows over “flags and statues” are diverting attention away from “the major long-term strategic problem facing Northern Ireland – that is demographic change,” he says. “If we’re struggling now, and if we get lots of people who are needing more care, intensive care, more health access, I don’t see how the system is going to manage if it continues as it is at present.”
Hetherington agrees the “status quo is not an option”.
“But rather than frame it as a really bleak outlook, there should be more optimism,” he says.
“People are living longer, this is good news. But it isn’t just about living 10 years longer, it’s about having 10 years longer of a healthy life.
“That will facilitate people working longer.”
A “relentless focus” is required to grow the economy and embracing new technologies such as AI is a “big part of the solution”.
“As an economist, AI is something that has been front of mind for the last of couple of years.
“In simple terms, AI won’t take your job – but someone using AI will. So it may as well be you.” More centralised healthcare services are required; experts have warned over the past 20 years that the duplication of services across multiple acute hospitals is not sustainable.
“Yes, that means having to travel further for health services but there are better outcomes,” says Hetherington.
“At the minute, it seems to me the public would rather die in a hospital five miles from home than recover in a hospital 25 miles from home.
“If people just expect and want services at their doorstep, that’s not sustainable.
“The focus is currently on the here and now, we’re not looking to the future. That needs to change.”