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5
to the present unsettled conditions affecting labour, and
financial problems, will cause delay in immediate advancement
in these directions.
Since compiling my Report, statistics and tables, the
Registrar-General has forwarded me his official Estimate of
the Civil population of the district, which he estimates at
53,184 persons. In his communication to me he states "That
the war has made it impossible to adhere to the methods of
estimation of local and national populations hitherto in use.
Men of military age have been largely drafted to military
training centres, or sent abroad with the Army, and the remainder
of the male adult population, as well as, to a lesser
extent, the female population, has migrated on an unprecedented
scale into areas other than those in which it was
enumerated at the last census." He has therefore arrived at
his figure from information gathered from the National
Register, etc., which he considers forms a more reliable basis
of estimation.
The Registrar states: "The question of the population
to be used for the calculation of birth rates has also required
attention. The births registered are not only those of the
children of civilians, and the estimates of Civil population
therefore form an unsuitable basis for the calculation of birth
rates. It is impossible to frame any estimate that would give
reliable birth rates, and it is suggested therefore that the
birth rate for 1915 be based upon the existing estimated
population for 1914."
The Death and Birth Rates, based upon the RegistrarGeneral's
estimated population, would therefore be:—Gross
Death Rate, 10.86 per 1,000 ; Recorded Death Rate, 9.88
per 1,000; Corrected Death Rate, 9.75 per 1,000. The
Birth Rate, 21.86 per 1,000.
In March of this year I have information from a reliable
source that between three and four thousand men are now
serving in the Army from this district, and are mostly
stationed or billeted in other parts of the country.