Census shows suburbs surge

New data compiled from recently released Census 2016 figures has revealed the cities of Rockingham and Kwinana both experienced significant population boosts in the past five years, with the suburbs of Baldivis and Wellard playing a key role.

The figures, which were released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics last week, showed Rockingham’s population surged more than 20 per cent from 104,105 to 125,114.

Playing a huge role in Rockingham’s growth was Baldivis, with the booming suburb’s population almost doubling to 31,653 from 15,883 in 2011.

Kwinana, meanwhile, had a 33 per cent population increase, with 38,918 people now calling the area home.

Fuelling this rise was the growth of Wellard, which almost tripled its population from 3246 to 9096 people. Curtin University population analysis expert Amanda Davies said Baldivis was a place people moved to so they could own their own home.

“Over a 10-year period there’s been an increase of 7700 households having mortgages and also, added to that, an increase of 2152 who own their property outright,” Dr Davies said. “You also still have a very high number of people moving from England itself, but it now also includes people from Wales, Scotland and Ireland.

“Kwinana is still extraordinarily dominated by people from a European background and particularly the British, but there is growth in the Indian population.”

Kwinana and Rockingham also followed the rising national trend of atheism, with 37 per cent of people in Rockingham and 33.7 per cent in Kwinana describing themselves as having no religion.

Financially, residents in Rockingham have seen their median weekly household income rise from $1410 to $1555, while Kwinana’s also went up from $1253 to $1471.

The increase in household income has also correlated with a rise in rent across the two cities, with median weekly rent in Rockingham now up by $50 to $350, while Kwinana’s sits $65 higher at $325 a week.

When it came to mortgage repayments, people in Rockingham were paying on average $1950 a month, $50 less than they were in 2011.

In Kwinana on the other hand, average repayments increased by $13 to $1813 a month.

English remained by far the most common language, with Afrikaans, Tagalog and Mandarin prevalent in both areas.