Four out of 10 women have first child outside marriage

MORE than four out of 10 women are having their first child outside of marriage, new figures show.

And the statistics published yesterday by the Central Statistics Office also show that a third of all children were born outside marriage in 2006.

There were 65,425 births in 2006 – 33,655 males and 31,770 females, an increase of 4,053 on 2005 and the largest natural population increase since 1983 when there were 67,117 births.