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QUALITY DECLARATION - SUMMARY

INSTITUTIONAL ENVIRONMENT

For information on the institutional environment of the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), including the legislative obligations of the ABS, financing and governance arrangements, and mechanisms for scrutiny of ABS operations, please see ABS Institutional Environment.

The Motor Vehicle Census collates vehicles which were registered with a motor vehicle registration authority at 31 March 2008. The data is collected under the legislation of each state and territory for the purposes of licensing vehicles to drive on public roads and the collection of third party insurance.


RELEVANCE

The Motor Vehicle Census includes all vehicles registered with a state, territory or other government motor vehicle registry for unrestricted use on public roads with the following exceptions:
§ recreational vehicles such as trail bikes and sand dune buggies intended for off-road use in most states and territories (in Victoria and Queensland these vehicles must be registered and are thus included in the statistics);
§ consular vehicles; and
§ vehicles registered by the defence forces.

Vehicles on register are defined as those vehicles registered at the date of the census, or had registration expire less than one month before that date. Data reflects the information as recorded in registration documents.

Motor Vehicle Censuses have been conducted regularly since 1971 but not every year and not always at the same time of the year. Refer to paragraph 2 of the Explanatory Notes for a list of snapshot dates from 1971.

Data are classified geographically by state or territory of registration and postcode of owner.


TIMELINESS

The snapshot date for the annual Motor Vehicle Census is currently 31 March of the reference year. The statistics are generally released within 8 months of the snapshot being taken.

ACCURACY

The size of the registered motor vehicle fleet (above 15 million vehicles) dictates that quality assurance of each record is not possible. Considerable effort is made by the ABS, to improve data quality with consistency checks and comparisons but records are not queried with the motor vehicle registries.

Care should be taken when comparing data items across jurisdictions as there is variation in the reporting from different states and territories.

In addition, data items where conversions eg fuel type or reconfigurations of vehicles have occurred, may not be accurately reported or recorded at the Registry.

For vehicles manufactured during or after 1990, the statistics eg identifying make and model information are based on procedures using the VIN, adopted by state and territory motor vehicle registration authorities.

COHERENCE

The types of fuel being used for motor vehicles has undergone some change in recent years. Leaded petrol is no longer available for sale, however, some older vehicles are still recorded as this fuel type by the MVRs. Hybrid vehicles are increasing, however, not all state and territory MVRs are identifying these vehicles separately.

Statistics from the annual MVC are comparable to previous censuses.

Data from the MVC when categorised by year of manufacture can be confronted with Sales of New Motor Vehicles, Australia, cat. no. 9314.0. In addition, the MVC is used as a frame for the Survey of Motor Vehicle Use, Australia cat. no. 9208.0.

INTERPRETABILITY

The Motor Vehicle Census publication contains detailed Introductory Notes, Explanatory Notes and Glossary that provide information on the data sources, terminology, classifications and other technical aspects associated with these statistics.


ACCESSIBILITY

In addition to the information provided in the publication, a series of data cubes are also available from the ABS website. The datacubes are accessed using the SuperTABLE product. Further data is available as a consultancy on a fee for service basis.