Tile Hill place based profile

Tile Hill is a neighbourhood in the west of Coventry. Broad Lane and Tile Hill Lane are major roads running alongside and through the area; Broad Lane running across the north of the area where it bounds with the area of Eastern Green and Tile Hill Lane divides the neighbourhood into Tile Hill North and Tile Hill South. Tile Hill is bounded to the south with the neighbourhood of Canley, divided by Torrington Avenue, which is partly industrial and commercial where many businesses are located, and the railway line.

The map below illustrates the Tile Hill neighbourhood, the area bounded by the red line is the area used for the statistics described in this profile.

Population

It is important to understand how Coventry’s population and demographics is changing so that local communities and organisations can ensure that the city has the right services to meet the needs of its people.

What is the local picture? How does it compare?

Between the 2011 and 2021 Censuses, the population of Tile Hill increased by 381 people from 6,167 in 2011 to 6,548 in 2021. This is a 6.2% growth rate, slightly lower than the city overall which saw an overall increase of 8.9%.

Tile Hill's median age of 37 positions it slightly older than Coventry’s average of 35 but younger than the national average of 40. The area’s age profile reveals some distinct characteristics compared to the rest of the city. Tile Hill has a higher proportion of children, with 21.0% of residents aged 0-15, compared to Coventry's 19.8%. In contrast, it has a slightly lower percentage of elderly residents (65+), at 13.8%, compared to 14.6% across Coventry and 18.6% nationally. There is the lower proportion of young adults (16-24 years), which makes up just 10.3% of Tile Hill residents compared to 15.4% across Coventry. This disparity is likely due to a lower number of university students in Tile Hill, unlike other parts of Coventry that house a large student population. These figures indicate that, while Tile Hill appears "younger" in some respects, the overall median age is raised by a relatively high number of residents aged 50-64, contributing to the older population compared to Coventry.

Although the population hasn't aged significantly in recent years, future projections suggest that it will experience a noticeable increase in its elderly population. The growth rate among residents aged 65 and over is expected to surpass that of younger age groups.

The population pyramid diagram below demonstrates how the age profile of the Tile Hill population differs from Coventry overall.

Like Coventry overall, the total number of births to mothers living in Tile Hill has fallen over recent years, however it is still higher than the city average. The number of births in 2021 was 89, down from 120 in 2014, however Tile Hill still had a relatively high birth rate. In 2021 the ratio of live births to 1,000 resident women aged 15-44 was above the city's average of 52.0, at 63.7.

Overall, the average household size in the area is smaller than the Coventry average, with a relatively high number of working age people living alone.  The Census 2021 counted 3,028 households in total in the area, with an average of 2.13 people per household compared to 2.48 across the city overall; Tile Hill ranks as one of the lowest areas of the city in terms of household size. There are relatively many single person households in the area, with 11.4% of all households made up of a single person over 65 compared to 11.6% across Coventry overall and 31.0% are other single person households (people aged 65 and younger living on their own) compared to 18.8% across Coventry overall. Tile Hill is amongst the areas of Coventry with the highest proportion of households made up of working age people (16-65) living alone.

Lone parent households with dependent children are more commonly found in Tile Hill compared to the average for the city and couple family households with dependent children are less commonly found. 10.8% of all households in the area are lone parent family households with dependent children compared to 8.3% across Coventry overall. 9.4% of all households are couple family households with dependent children compared to 14.9% across Coventry overall.

We can understand more about our communities by using Geodemographic segmentation. The Acorn geodemographic profiler data model from CACI ltd categorises all UK households into 6 main categories ranked from most to least wealthy. Tile Hill has a higher proportion of households in the three categories with the lowest wealth levels (88.0%, compared to 80.0% for Coventry). Moreover, two specific groups make up more than half of the total population of Tile Hill and are significantly more common here than across Coventry overall:

• Challenging circumstances – (Single people across all ages, living in high rise estates).  People living in this type of household make up 39% of the population of Tile Hill compared to 7% across Coventry overall.
• Cash-Strapped families – (A lot of families and single parents with young children who live in social housing depend on benefits).  20% of the residents in Tile Hill compared to 8% of the whole of Coventry.

Acorn Wellbeing assigns households to different health categories. In Tile Hill a large proportion of the population live in households assigned to the groups with the greatest health challenges. The main four groups that Acorn Wellbeing uses to classify residents are:

1. Health Challenges (highest levels of illness, often areas with higher elderly population).  While only 12% of the households in Coventry belong to group 1 - Health Challenges households, this percentage is much higher, more than half - 57%, for the Tile Hill household population.
2. At Risk - 21% of the people live in Tile Hill households in this group, lower than Coventry at 39%.
3. Caution - A much lower proportion of the population, 11% of households live in group 3 in Tile Hill compared to the city at 33% households.
4. Healthy (more affluent neighbourhoods with low levels of illness given their age). 9% of the people in Tile Hill are living in households assigned to this group, which is the healthiest category, much lower than the proportion of all people across Coventry (15%).

Looking in more detail, one specific type within Health Challenges “Hardship Heartlands’ makes up more than half of the population of Tile Hill:

• Health Challenges – Hardship Heartlands (Relatively young people who are social renters with relatively unhealthy lifestyles) - 53% of Tile Hill’s population, compared to Coventry 7%.

Diversity    

Why is this important?

It is important to understand how Coventry’s population and demographics is changing so that local communities and organisations can ensure that the city has the right services to meet the needs of its people.

What is the local picture? How does it compare?

Tile Hill is not as diverse as other areas, with 26.7% of the people belonging to an ethnic minority group, while across Coventry overall it is 44.7%. We use ‘ethnic minorities’ to refer to all ethnic groups except the White British group. Ethnic minorities include white minorities, such as Gypsy, Roma, and Irish Traveller groups, as well as ‘White Other’ which typically covers people from other European countries.  

26.7% of all people living in Tile Hill are a part of an ethnic minority group according to the 2021 Census, which is 11.2 percentage points higher than 15.5% in 2011; indicating that the population of people from ethnic minority groups in the area has grown. The share of the population who identified as White British on their census decreased from 84.5% in 2011 to 73.3% in 2021.

People of White Other ethnicity is the biggest group among the population from ethnic minority groups, making up 7.7% of Tile Hill's total population, compared to 8.2% of Coventry's total. Black African is the next biggest group, making up 5.7% of Tile Hill's total population, compared to 7.0% of Coventry's total.

There has been growth in the local White Other and Black African communities. Between 2011 and 2021 there has been a 4.2 percentage point increase in people reporting as White Other making up 7.7% in 2021, up from 3.5% in 2011. The Black African population has also grown, rising from 3.7% in 2011 to 5.7% in 2021. There was also a 1.5 percentage point rise in Asian Indian residents to 2.0% in 2021 from 0.5% in 2011, making it the third largest group.

With a larger percentage of school children from an ethnic minority than all residents in Tile Hill as a whole, the area may continue to become more diverse. 65.5% of pupils who live in Tile Hill, according to the annual school census 2021, were of White British ethnicity, which means that 34.5% were from ethnic minority groups; a higher proportion for the population of all ages taken from the Census 2021 (73.3%).

The largest ethnic minority groups amongst school pupils are the similar to those amongst the overall population, Black African ethnicity (11.0%), White Other ethnicity (8.7%), ‘Any Other Asian background’ (2.7%) and ‘Any other mixed background’ (1.9%).

Religious affiliation of residents in Tile Hill is less common than it is across Coventry overall. 42.4% of those who answered the question in Census 2021 said they had no religion, which is more than the average of 31.6% for all Coventry residents. Christianity is the most common single religion, with 50.2% of the residents following it, which is higher than the average of 46.8% for Coventry overall. Islam is the second most practiced religion, with 4.4% of the residents following it, which is lower than the average of 11.0% for Coventry overall. Hinduism is less prevalent, with 1.1% for Tile Hill, compared to 4.2% for Coventry overall. Sikhism is also less common, with 0.9%, compared to 5.3% for Coventry overall.

A higher-than-average proportion speak English as their main language, although there are several other languages spoken by local residents. In the Census 2021, 10.8% of Tile Hill residents indicated that English is not their first language, compared to 17.5% of people across the city as a whole. 7.1% of all households in Tile Hill have no one who speaks English as their main language.  This doesn’t mean that these people cannot speak English at all, only 1.5% cannot speak English well or at all, lower than the city average, 3.5%.

In Tile Hill, Polish (2.6%), ‘Any other EU language’ (likely to be mostly Romanian) (2.5%), ‘African languages’ (0.8%), ‘West or Central Asian languages’ (0.7%), French (0.6%) and Arabic (0.5%) are the most common main languages spoken aside from English.

Newly arrived communities are part of the local community, although there are proportionally fewer people living in Till Hill who moved to the UK from overseas, compared to the average for Coventry.  Data from the Census 2021 shows 81.8% of Tile Hill residents were born in the UK which is higher than the overall proportion for Coventry at 72.1%. The census data also gives a richer picture of recent migration: 8.6% of all Tile Hill residents were born outside the UK and arrived in the UK in the previous 10 years, significantly lower than the average for Coventry overall of 14.2%.

Newly arrived communities to Coventry are from diverse sources, and include people migrating for economic reasons, international students and asylum seekers and refugees, amongst other reasons. We know that there are few asylum seekers living in Tile Hill however, and international students do not form a significant part of the local population.  3.7% of the population is made up of all students aged 18+ (not just international students) compared to 9.8% for Coventry overall (and much higher in areas where students concentrate).

Tile Hill has welcomed new people through international migration in recent years, although this has been less in number than many other areas of Coventry. While there is uncertainty in measuring international migration due to challenges collecting accurate data, the number of foreign nationals living in Coventry and newly registering for a National Insurance Number (NINo) gives an indication of this and how the trends in movement have changed over recent years. In 2022 this totalled 78 people for Tile Hill, a lower number per head of population than the city average. The increase for Coventry in 2022 was significantly higher, reflecting an increase back to levels similar to pre pandemic years, following a significant dip in migration in 2020. This was not the case in Tile Hill, the chart below illustrates recent annual trends. 

Source: Department for Work and Pensions, https://stat-xplore.dwp.gov.uk/ 

Coventry Household Survey data indicates that overall feelings of belonging, and cohesion in Tile Hill have reduced in recent years. Coventry Household Survey data indicates that 60% of residents agreed that their neighbourhood is a place where people from different backgrounds got on well together, similar to Coventry overall (63%) but a significant reduction since 2018 (76%). These estimates have margins of error associated when inferring about the whole population because the survey was only asked of a sample of residents, but the size of change does indicate that this has reduced amongst the wider population of the area over that period.

49% of respondents said they felt a sense of belonging to their neighbourhood, about average for Coventry overall (54%) but down from 59% in 2018. All residents were subsequently asked if the Covid-19 outbreak has changed their sense of belonging to their local community. Only 6% of people feel a stronger sense of belonging to their local community after Covid-19, lower than the city average of 13%.

While the Household Survey 2022 responses give indications of reducing cohesion and belonging, it gives more positive indications about the ‘involvement’ of Tile Hill people in their community. The Coventry Household Survey 2022 found that 49% of residents from this area agreed that there are opportunities to get actively involved in improving their local area, higher than respondents across the whole of Coventry (38%). 48% of residents indicated that they were likely to get more involved in the next 12 months, compared to 51% across Coventry overall. Only 17% of the local area indicated that they volunteered with an organisation prior to the pandemic, compared to the Coventry average of 20%. However, since then, this proportion has increased to 23%, compared to the Coventry average of 21%.