London Borough of Newham

The London Borough of Newham () is a London borough created in 1965 by the London Government Act 1963. It covers an area previously administered by the Essex county boroughs of West Ham and East Ham, authorities that were both abolished by the same act. The name Newham reflects its creation and combines the compass points of the old borough names. It is east of the City of London and north of the River Thames (the Woolwich Ferry, Woolwich foot tunnel and Silvertown tunnel provide crossings to the south). Newham is bounded by the River Lea to its west and the North Circular Road to its east.

Situated in the Inner London part of East London, Newham has a population of 387,576, which is the third highest of the London boroughs. It is the 25th most populous district in England. The local authority is Newham London Borough Council.

Newham was one of the six host boroughs for the 2012 Summer Olympics, for which most of the Olympic Park, including the London Stadium, was developed. It is also the site of the London City Airport. Major districts include East Ham, West Ham, Stratford, Plaistow, Forest Gate, Manor Park, Beckton and Canning Town.

History The borough was formed on 1 April 1965 under the London Government Act 1963, as a borough of the newly formed Greater London. It broadly covered the areas of the county borough of East Ham and the county borough of West Ham that were abolished by the same act. These in turn were successors to the ancient civil and ecclesiastical parishes of East Ham and West Ham. Green Street and Boundary Road mark the former boundary between the two.

North Woolwich also became part of the borough (previously part of the Metropolitan Borough of Woolwich, the majority of which lay south of the River Thames), as did a small area around Gallions Reach west of the River Roding which had previously been part of the Municipal Borough of Barking. East Ham, West Ham and Barking had all historically been part of the county of Essex, whilst Woolwich had been part of Kent prior to becoming part of the County of London in 1889. Newham was devised for the borough as an entirely new name.Mills, Anthony David (2001). Dictionary of London Place Names. Oxford University Press.

Manor of Ham The area of the modern borough was at one time occupied by a manor (an estate or landholding with certain legal responsibilities) called 'Ham'. The name comes from Old English and means 'a dry area of land between rivers or marshland', referring to the location of the settlement within boundaries formed by the rivers Lea, Thames and Roding and their marshes.

The first known written use of the term, as 'Hamme', is in an Anglo-Saxon charter of 958, in which King Edgar granted the area to Ealdorman Athelstan. The territory was undivided at that time. A subsequent charter of 1037 describes a transfer of land which has been identified with East Ham, indicating that the division of the territory occurred between 958 and 1037.The Place Names of Essex, P.H. Reaney, 1969

The Domesday Book shows landholdings divided further, and by the end of the 12th century these manors were being served, singly or in groups of manors, by the familiar ancient parishes of West Ham, East Ham and Little Ilford (now also known as Manor Park), with some areas by the Roding a part of Barking, and the area now known as North Woolwich attached to Woolwich. The earliest recorded use of the name West Ham, Westhamma, comes in 1186, and East Ham, Estham, is recorded in 1204.

The boundary between West and East Ham was drawn from the now lost Hamfrith Waste and Hamfrith Wood in the north (then the southernmost parts of Epping Forest which extended as far south as the Romford Road at that time), along Green Street down to the small, also lost, natural harbour known as Ham Creek. Ham Creek was filled-in in the nineteenth century,'West Ham: Introduction', in A History of the County of Essex: Volume 6, ed. W R Powell (London, 1973), pp. 43-50. British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/essex/vol6/pp43-50 [accessed 11 November 2022]. but the small residual head of the creek still formed the boundary between the two areas into the late 20th century, when what remained was also filled in.

The formation of the modern borough in 1965 saw the merger of West and East Ham, together with North Woolwich and Barking west of the River Roding. Little Ilford had become part of East Ham as part of earlier local government reorganisations.

Medieval period The prosperity of the area increased due to the construction of Bow Bridge, the only bridge over the Lea, and the creation of Stratford Langthorne Abbey.

Governance

The local authority is Newham Council, which meets at Newham Town Hall in East Ham and has its main offices at 1000 Dockside Road, overlooking the Royal Albert Dock. Since 2002 the council has been led by a directly elected Mayor of Newham.

Greater London representation Since 2000, for elections to the London Assembly, the borough forms part of the City and East constituency.

Demography

Population figures

Newham has, after Barnet and Croydon, the third highest population of the London boroughs, with a population numbering 382,984 as of 2021. Despite growing since the 1980s, it is still drastically lower than its pre-war peak. In the period between 1951 and 1981, Newham's population shrunk by 28.87% owing to factors such as the war bombings and the increasingly high unemployment. The redevelopment of the Docklands as well as development related to the 2012 Olympics have contributed to reversing its declining trend.

Ethnicities

Newham has the youngest overall population and one of the lowest White British populations in the country according to the 2011 UK Census. At 32%, the borough has the second-highest percentage of Muslims in the UK, after the neighbouring London Borough of Tower Hamlets. A 2017 report from Trust for London and the New Policy Institute found that 36% of local employees in Newham are in low paid work; the highest percentage of any London borough. Newham also has a 37% poverty rate, which is the second-highest rate in London. Average income in Newham is £52,342 per year, compared with the London average of £60,319, which is approximately 13.2% lower than the London average.

Newham is very ethnically diverse. When using Simpson's Diversity Index on 10 aggregated ethnic groups, the 2001 UK Census identified Newham as the most ethnically diverse district in England and Wales, with 9 wards in the top 15. Greater London Authority, January 2006), accessed 13 December 2006 However, when using the 16 ethnic categories in the Census so that White Irish and White Other ethnic minorities are also included in the analysis, Newham becomes the second-most ethnically diverse borough with six out of the top 15 wards, behind Brent with 7 out of the top 15 wards.

Newham has the lowest percentage of both total White and White British residents of all of London's boroughs. The joint-lowest wards with White British population are Green Street East and Green Street West, each having 4.8% – the third-lowest behind Southall Broadway and Southall Green in Ealing. East Ham North follows closely, at 4.9%.

As of the 2021 UK census, people of "Bangladeshi" ethnicity are the largest single group in the borough at 15.9%. "White British" are the second largest group at 14.8%, with "White Other" third largest at 14.6%, "African" fourth largest at 11.6%, "Indian" next largest at 11% and then "Pakistani" at 8.9%. Newham has had a large Asian community for many decades; more than half of Newham's Upton and Kensington wards were of ethnic minority origin in 1981. The nationality to increase the most in number since 1991 is the Bangladeshi community. Newham has the largest total population of Asian origin in London; it is notably a borough with high populations of all three largest British Asian nationalities, having the 5th highest Indian population in London and the 2nd highest each for both Pakistani and Bangladeshi.

Newham has 1,340 residents who were born in Ukraine, the highest population of Ukrainians in the UK. Ethnic Group1971 estimations1981 estimations1991 census2001 census2011 census2021 censusNumber%Number%Number%Number%Number%Number% White: Total –89.1%141,04369%126,70857.3% 96,130 39.42% 89,216 28.97% 107,947 30.8% White: British–––––– 82,390 33.78% 51,516 16.73% 51,819 14.8% White: Irish–––––– 3,231 1.32% 2,172 0.71% 2,039 0.6% White: Gypsy or Irish Traveller–––––– – – 462 0.15% 353 0.1% White: Roma–––––– – – – – 2,342 0.7% White: Other–––––– 10,509 4.31% 35,066 11.39% 51,394 14.6% Asian or Asian British: Total ––38,20318.7%59,25726.8% 81,651 33.48% 133,895 43.47% 148,187 42.3% Asian or Asian British: Indian––22,25929,105 29,597 12.14% 42,484 13.79% 38,642 11.0% Asian or Asian British: Pakistani––9,21413,162 20,644 8.46% 30,307 9.84% 31,216 8.9% Asian or Asian British: Bangladeshi––3,0198,550 21,458 8.80% 37,262 12.10% 55,677 15.9% Asian or Asian British: Chinese––1,1091,803 2,349 0.96% 3,930 1.28% 6,213 1.8% Asian or Asian British: Other Asian ––2,6026,637 7,603 3.12% 19,912 6.47% 16,439 4.7% Black or Black British: Total ––23,04611.3%32,21414.6% 52,653 21.59% 60,256 19.56% 61,302 17.4% Black or Black British: African––6,68612,639 31,982 13.11% 37,811 12.28% 40,874 11.6% Black or Black British: Caribbean––13,52816,015 17,931 7.35% 15,050 4.89% 13,586 3.9% Black or Black British: Other Black––2,8323,560 2,740 1.12% 7,395 2.40% 6,842 1.9% Mixed or British Mixed: Total –––––– 8,248 3.38% 13,945 4.53% 16,419 4.6% Mixed: White and Black Caribbean –––––– 2,986 1.22% 3,957 1.28% 4,253 1.2% Mixed: White and Black African –––––– 1,657 0.68% 3,319 1.08% 3,317 0.9% Mixed: White and Asian –––––– 1,652 0.68% 2,677 0.87% 3,324 0.9% Mixed: Other Mixed –––––– 1,953 0.80% 3,992 1.30% 5,525 1.6% Other: Total ––2,1083,121 5,209 2.14% 10,672 3.47% 17,175 4.9% Other: Arab –––––– – – 3,523 1.14% 3,534 1.0% Other: Any other ethnic group –––––– 5,209 2.14% 7,149 2.32% 13,641 3.9% Ethnic minority: Total –10.9%63,39731%94,59242.7% 147,761 60.58% 218,768 71.03% 246,617 69.2% Total –100%204,440 100%221,300100% 243,891 100% 307,984 100% 351,030 100%

Health In 2018, Newham had the lowest life expectancy and the highest rate of heart disease of all London boroughs together with the London Borough of Tower Hamlets.

In 2019, the BBC reported that Newham had the highest rate of tuberculosis in the UK at 107 per population, which was higher than Rwanda (69) and Iraq (45) according to WHO figures from 2013. More than 80% of TB cases in London occur in people born abroad. The UK average was 13.

Religion

The following table shows the religious identity of residents residing in Newham according to the 2001, 2011 and the 2021 censuses.

Religion200120112021Number%Number%Number% Christian 114,247 46.8 123,119 40.0 123,746 35.3 Muslim 59,293 24.3 98,456 32.0 122,146 34.8 Jewish 481 0.2 342 0.1 448 0.1 Hindu 16,901 6.9 26,962 8.8 21,405 6.1 Sikh 6,897 2.8 6,421 2.1 5,638 1.6 Buddhism 1,592 0.7 2,446 0.8 2,160 0.6 Other religion 664 0.3 1,090 0.4 1,765 0.5 No religion 21,978 9.0 29,373 9.5 50,795 14.5 Religion not stated 21,838 9.0 19,775 6.4 22,933 6.5 Total 243,891 100.00% 307,894 100.00% 351,100 100.0%

Transgender identity