Muhammed most popular name in London....

An interesting look at names and how they count them in the UK...

If taken together the various different spellings of Mohammed make the name the second most common name in England and Wales - and by far the most popular in both London and the West Midlands.

Jack was the most chosen name for boys for the 13th year running but is being pushed hard by Mohammed and its various alternative spellings which are expected to reach the top spot soon.

Olivia was the top name for new-born girls in 2008, replacing the previous year’s favourite Ruby, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics.

The ONS was criticised for treating the various spellings of Mohammed as different names. It only published the top 100 names for each sex which meant figures were only released for three variations of Mohammed.

Mohammed was placed 16th with 3,423, Muhammad 37th with 2,068 and Mohammad 65th with 1,100.

Figures for five other alternative spellings - Muhammed (496), Mohamed (428), Mohamad (40), Muhamed (11) and Mohammod (10) - were later released to the Daily Telegraph.

That made a total of 7,576 and put Mohammed and its alternative spellings ahead of the official second place name, Oliver, of whom there were 7,413. There were 8,007 Jacks.

In London 724 baby boys were given the name Mohammed, traling behind 844 Daniels. But adding the various other spellings of Mohammed would more than double its total and make it by far the most popular name in the capital.

The same is true of the West Midlands where the specific spelling Mohammed (751) was only just behind Jack (768) and the Yorkshire and Humber region where Mohammed (607) was fourth behind Jack (854).

Controversy over the ranking of Mohammed follows a similar episode in Holland where official statistics also counted the different spellings as separate names. That artificially kept the name of Islam’s founder outside the Dutch top 20.

Figures later obtained by a magazine there showed that Mohammed and its variations in fact constituted the most popular name in the country’s four biggest cities.