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Brighton and Hove has 'gayest' young people, Census data reveals

Census data revealed that Brighton and Hove has the highest number of people aged under 35 who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual
Census data revealed that Brighton and Hove has the highest number of people aged under 35 who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual

Brighton has the highest proportion of lesbian, gay and bisexual people aged under 35 anywhere in England, new Census figures show.

The 2021 Census reveals data about the sexual orientation of people living in England and Wales, providing a snapshot of the sexuality of different ages across the country on the day of the Census - March 21, 2021.

More than 6,000 people aged between 16 and 24 in the city said they identified with a sexuality other than heterosexual, along with almost 6,000 people aged 25 to 34.

It means about 14.8 per cent of those aged under 35 in Brighton and Hove identified with an LGB+ sexuality - the highest percentage across the two nations.

The category covers people identifying as lesbian, gay or bisexual, as well as pansexual, asexual, queer or any other sexual orientation apart from heterosexual.

On the other end of the scale, Slough had the lowest proportion of under 35-year-olds who identified with an LGB+ sexuality, at just 2.8 per cent.

It comes after the “gayest” neighbourhoods in Brighton and Hove were revealed, with 15 communities in the city having a higher than average proportion of LGB+ people.

In Kemp Town, more than one in five residents (20.11 per cent) aged 16 and over identified as LGB+, the highest proportion in Brighton and Hove.

A spokeswoman for LGBTQ+ charity Stonewall said the latest Census breakdown shows that, with each passing generation, more people feel safer to come out and live as their true selves.

She said: “Following the initial data showing over 1.5 million lesbian, gay and bi people living in England and Wales, we now see that younger generations feel safer to be themselves.

“Each generation reports more lesbian, gay and bi people than the last - but that doesn’t necessarily mean there are now simply more of us.

“It suggested that older generations were not always safe or free to speak about their experiences or lacked the language to describe them.”