SURVEY OF SPENDING

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33189, 31 March 1973, Page 1

SURVEY OF SPENDING

CVetr Zcalai.d Pres* Association) WELLINGTON. March 30. I'he Department of Statistics will begin next month a survey of the spending patterns of private householders —a survey calling for a representative sample of New Zealand households to keep daily records of all spending over a short period.

Announcing this today, the Minister in charge of the department (Mr Rowling) said that authorised interviewers would also seek from households information on major items of expenditure, such as housing, and about regular payments, such as rates and insurance, not likely to be made during the short time of daily records. ‘‘The sample requires thi co-operation of about 450( households throughout Nev Zealand each year." said M Rowling. ‘‘This is the first time suer a household survey has beer conducted bv the Departmen

jof Statistics, although sucn (surveys are carried out expensively overseas and are Inow widely accepted in statistically developed countries las being indispensable to ■substantially improved ttttiaitical surveys, such as the (Consumers Price Index and a whole range of social and ; demographic surveys." The survey, he said, would provide authoritative firsthand information about what (the average New Zealand !consumer spent his money ion. I The information was essential to enable the present revision of the Consumers .Price Index to proceed ' Mr Rowling emphasised 'that as with all censuses and (statistical surveys, informsit ion collected about indi(vidua! persons and house- | holds would be confidential to the department. It would be processed in a way which scrupulously protected the privacy of the individual. More than 90 countries throughout the world conducted household surveys, Mr Rowling said. In New Zealand, the Government in 1971 set up a Consumers Price Index revi|sion advisory committee to assist the department in revising the index. The committee had recommended that the data for revising the index should come mainly from continuing household sur Iveys, plus data on housing, (national consumption, pro ;duction. and spending. Detailed planning for the (survey had been completed, and a small pilot test had ;been done in December, said Mr Rowling. “Ready co-op-aeration of households was a pleasing feature of the pilot survey, he said. “I look for (ward confidently to the willing response of householder* .thus assuring the success of (the larger operation. ; “There is no doubt that the information from the survey will be of considerable (continuing benefit to New Zealand.” he said.