A good year for making babies

Amid the economic gloom there are suddenly a whole lot of new mouths to feed. A record number of babies were born last year - 285,200 - surpassing the previous record set in 1971 of 276,400, official figures show.

After years of declining fertility, the fertility rate jumped to 1.93 babies for each woman last year, up from 1.81 in 2006.

Fertility - defined as the average number of babies that a woman could expect to have during her reproductive lifetime on current trends - is now at its highest level since 1981, when it was 1.94.

But would-be parents are expected to delay having children over the next year or two.

Dr Rebecca Kippen, from the Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute at the Australian National University, said that history showed people tended to delay having children during economic downturns. "They just think, 'We can't afford to have another baby, so maybe we'll wait another year or a couple of years and then decide.' "

Dr Kippen said increased fertility over the past decade had been helped by rising real wealth, which had given parents the financial stability to have more children. "Until the current financial crisis, there has been an increased confidence that, financially, it has been a good time to have children."

Government policies had also played a role, she said.

"Both the previous Coalition government and the current Government have been supportive of families having children, not only in material support, but they have also said that they support 'working families' and I think that's contributed.

"The baby bonus probably hasn't hurt."

The vice-president of Relationships Australia, Anne Hollonds, said the baby bonus had encouraged families who were already likely to have children to have a few more.

"It's not necessarily that a whole lot of people who would otherwise not have had babies are suddenly having babies, but those [who] were already in a mind to have babies are feeling able to have more."

However, last year could prove to be the high point for births as increasing money woes strained relationships and reduced families' ability to pay for children.

"Money and work pressures are two of the biggest areas of stress that people comment upon, and at the moment there is a lot of anxiety," she said.

"If the current economic uncertainty and anxiety continues, then that may have a dampening effect on people's aspirations to have as many children."

The figures released yesterday by the Bureau of Statistics show fertility is highest among the 30- to 34-year-old age group.

Dr Kippen said part of the overall increase in fertility could be attributed to a wave of women who had delayed childbirth in their 20s during the late 1990s and early 2000s were now getting around to it in their 30s.

She predicted that the economic slowdown would reduce the number of babies born in the short term, but there would be a "catch up" at some point.

"They usually catch up afterwards, so [women] have the same number [of babies] over their lifetime," she said.

The impact of the economic slowdown would also take some time to show up in birth numbers: "It probably won't show up for the next year or two, because people already have pregnancies under way."

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