In a much needed break from the doom and gloom, Edinburgh Live can reveal that this year's top baby names have been revealed, and there are some fascinating names on the list.
The most popular names haven't changed: Jack and Olivia have hung onto the top spot, which means a lot of Jacks and Olivias will be starting school in a few years!
The National Records of Scotland - who look after births, deaths and marriage - have revealed that 449 boys were named Jack in 2019, followed by 259 for Oliver and 345 for James.
For girls, the most popular name was Olivia, with 394 little girls being given the name this year. There were 388 for Emily and 364 girls named Isla.
And here are the newcomers to the top 100: Carson, Cody, Ellis, Louie, Roman, Sonny and Theodore for boys. Meanwhile Abbie, Ailsa, Aoife, Elizabeth, Eve, Evelyn, Harley, Lottie, Lucie, Mirren, Myla, Nova and Scarlett all entered for girls.
These new lists below replace the top 100 lists published in December, with the NRS report now including the first forename of every baby whose birth was registered in December.
NRS’s website identifies the top names in each decade. For example, the top three first forenames for births that were registered from 2010 to 2019 for boys were Jack (5,424 babies in ten years), James (4,140) and Lewis (3,921); for girls, Sophie (5,002 babies in ten years), Emily (4,765) and Olivia (4,732).
The name James continues to be popular and is the only name to have been in the top ten for its sex in every year from 1974 (the first for which the NRS website provides this information).
However, many once popular names have now gone out of fashion. For example, David, John and Paul, were the top three boys’ names in 1975, but they were not in their top tens in 2000 or 2015 and, in 2019, 101 boys had David as their first forename, 79 were named John and only 22 were named Paul.
Alan Ferrier, Head of Demographic Statistics at National Records of Scotland said: “Jack and Olivia continue to be the most popular baby names in Scotland, however, this year, over 5,000 unique baby names were registered, which suggests that parents may be striving for originality and individuality when naming their children.
“Looking outside the top 100 names, it’s interesting to see the impact that popular culture is having on how parents name their children. More boys than ever are now called Ezra, which may be a result of the popularity of singer George Ezra.
“The Peaky Blinders trend has continued outside the top 100 names, the latest statistics show a continued rise in the number of babies named Cillian following the launch of the hit TV show and star actor Cillian Murphy, the names Polly and Chester have also increased in popularity in this time.”
NRS also published a list of the most common surnames in the Birth, Marriage and Death registers for 2019.
Smith, Brown and Wilson have been the three most popular surnames since the first such list, which is for 1975, and remained the top three in 2019.
