With the Referendum on EU membership our households
can concentrate on something European that doesn’t involve party political
broadcasts or politician’s treating us all like children – the Euro 2016
Football Tournament. Huddersfield is home to all
different backgrounds and nationalities so if you're not lucky enough to be
jetting off to France for the UEFA Euro 2016 football tournament, have no fear!
For a bit of fun (although there is a
serious side to this – you know there would be with me!) I have taken
a look at which European people live in Huddersfield so I know who to soak up
the best atmosphere with!
During my research some interesting numbers
appear. Going into the Euro 2016 tournament, France were 3/1 favourite’s, then
Germany 7/2, third Spain 11/2, then England 9/1, Italy 16/1, Poland 50/1, Romania
and Wales at 100/1, Ireland at 150/1 and Northern Ireland 500/1 (although Leicester were 5000/1 at the start of last season).
Of
the 95,296 residents of the Huddersfield Constituency for Westminster, of the
Home Nations going into the competition, 77,571 of them are from England, 427
from Wales, 384 from Northern Ireland and 936 from Ireland, although I do feel
sorry for the 1,103 Scots who didn’t get into the finals. Now interestingly, looking
at the Mainland Europeans residents in the Huddersfield Constituency, it might not
surprise you that they make up 3.04% of the population as a whole in the Westminster
area.
However,
even more fascinating, of those 3.04% European’s residents, 0.94% are from
Western Europe because EU residents from Eastern Europe - i.e. the Accession Countries to the EU between 2003 to 2007 (Czech
Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Slovenia,
Bulgaria and Romania) - only make up 2.1% of the
population of the Huddersfield Constituency.
Broken
down into the relevant football teams, there are in the Huddersfield Constituency
…
108 French people
308 Germans
203 Italians
48 Spanish
1,444 Poles
55 Romanians
… I feel sorry for the Spanish and Romanian
football supporters in Huddersfield!
But what does this have to do with the Huddersfield
property market? Quite a lot in fact. Many
of these European people were economic migrants, especially those from Eastern
Europe. A lot of people’s concerns over migration
are exaggerated as this EU migration has acted to fill gaps in skills and
labour supply during growth periods of the mid 2000’s and subsequently over the
last five years in Huddersfield, EU migrants have done little to displace
native workers but do the jobs us Brits don’t often want to do. There is
no preferential treatment for council housing in Huddersfield, so EU migrants
have in fact increased demand for privately rented accommodation in Huddersfield. This has meant, as demand for housing in Huddersfield has remained strong, Huddersfield landlords have continued to buy properties to rent out to keep up with this demand. Therefore, the value of every homeowner’s property in Huddersfield has been kept high because of the demand from these Huddersfield landlords buying starter homes to rent out, releasing existing homeowners to go up the property ladder – benefiting everyone in the chain.
However, rents have remained relatively subdued, in Huddersfield rents are only 18.6% higher than they were in 2005, not bad when you consider we have had 38.52% inflation in the UK economy as a whole over the same 11 years.
EU migration has meant existing homeowners, landlords and the economy as a whole in Huddersfield (and the UK) have benefitted from better economic conditions, property prices not slumping whilst rents have been kept in check by wage inflation. Now I wonder who will win the footy? Back to the TV!
For more thoughts on the Huddersfield property
market like this – visit the Huddersfield Property Blog https://huddersfieldproperty.blogspot.co.uk/
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