Demographics of Gibraltar

Demographic features of the population of Gibraltar include ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects.

The demographics of Gibraltar reflects Gibraltarians' racial and cultural fusion of the many European and non-European immigrants who came to the Rock over three hundred years.

The few Spaniards who remained in Gibraltar in August 1704 were augmented by others who arrived in the fleet with Prince George of Hesse-Darmstadt, possibly some two hundred in all, mostly Catalans.

This group, who represented a larger proportion in the beginning of the British period, are nowadays only about 3% of the total population (around 1,000 persons).

Major construction projects, such as the dockyard in the late 1890s and early 20th century brought large numbers of workers from Great Britain.

13% of Gibraltarian residents are from the United Kingdom and the electoral roll shows that 27% of Gibraltar's population has British surnames.

[5] Genoese came during the 18th and 19th centuries, especially from the poorer parts of Liguria, some of them annually following fishing shoals, as repairmen for the British navy, or as successful traders and merchants;[6] many others came during the Napoleonic period to avoid obligatory conscription to the French Army.

[11] A further increase in the community occurred when many Spaniards left their jobs in Gibraltar after General Franco closed the border in 1969.

By the end of 1968 there were at least 1,300 Moroccan workers resident in Gibraltar and this more than doubled following the final closure of the frontier with Spain in June 1969.

It consists of an eclectic mix of Andalusian Spanish and British English as well as languages such as Maltese, Portuguese, Italian of the Genoese variety and Haketia.