Australian Bureau of Statistics
Section 1: Agency overview and resources
1.1 Strategic direction
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) is Australia's official statistical agency. It provides statistics on a wide range of economic, environmental and social matters, covering government, business and the community in general. It also has an important leadership and coordination function with respect to the statistical activities of other official bodies, both in Australia and overseas.
The ABS mission is to assist and encourage informed decision making, research and discussion within governments and the community by leading a high quality, objective and responsive national statistical service. To achieve the ABS mission, the ABS has the following objectives:
- an expanded and improved National Statistical Service;
- services that are timely, relevant, responsive, and respected for their integrity and quality;
- informed and increased use of statistics;
- be a key contributor to international statistical activities that are important to Australia and to our region;
- an organisation that builds capability to continually improve its effectiveness;
- the trust and cooperation of the ABS' providers; and
- be a respected and strongly supported organisation.
The outcomes the ABS plans to achieve in 2008‑09 are set in the context of the objectives and mission statement. In addition to continued delivery of key statistical outputs, services and advice, the ABS will give particular emphasis to expanding the National Statistical Service (including improving the statistical value of administrative data) and a continuing contribution to the development of Standard Business Reporting.
The key external drivers of and challenges for the ABS work program include:
- the need for evidence‑based and coordinated policy and program delivery initiatives across departments and jurisdictions, driven by organisations such as the Council of Australian Governments (COAG);
- increasing complexity of the Australian economy and society, which complicates the production of existing statistics (for example, issues such as globalisation are placing additional demands on production of relevant economic and social statistics);
- increasing pressure to produce new and or more detailed outputs, which must be balanced with the need to maintain stable time series for longitudinal analysis;
- a wider range of sources of statistical data driving a need to ensure that the overall national statistical service is coordinated, and the ABS's role is clearly defined;
- emerging expectations of clients and the community for information producers to allow community‑based sharing of expertise, business processes and enabling technology (for example, enhancing the usefulness of spatial information from several sources);
- increasing demands for simplified interactions with government including the ABS. This is supported by a federal government agenda that emphasises reductions in red tape and greater information sharing (`create‑once, use‑many');
- increasing demands for access to microdata, data relating to particular population groups, longitudinal data and linked data (within a climate of concerns about individual privacy); and
- pressures to improve productivity and to create a staff profile more appropriate to the ABS' future skill needs, in an increasingly tight labour market where attraction and retention issues are presenting significant challenges.
The major risks to the ABS work program are captured in, and managed through the ABS Enterprise Risks framework. For 2008‑09, the major risks arising from the environment in which the ABS operates are in the areas of maintaining an adequate staffing and resource base to support the ABS' core program data integration initiatives across the Australian community (which need to be undertaken with careful consideration of confidentiality issues), and appropriately maintaining the interviewer workforce which collects a lot of key economic and social data at the heart of ABS statistics.
1.2 Agency resource statement
Table 1.1 shows the total resources from all origins. The table summarises how resources will be applied by the ABS.
Table 1.1: Australian Bureau of Statistics resource statement — Budget
Estimates for 2008‑09 as at Budget May 2008
1. Appropriation Bill (No.1) 2008‑09.
2. Appropriation Bill (No.2) 2008‑09.
3. Receipts received under s31 of the Financial Management and Accountability Act 1997.
4. Estimated adjusted balance carried forward from previous year for annual appropriations.
5. Estimated opening balance for special accounts. For further detail on special accounts see Table 3.1.3.
1.3 Budget measures
Table 1.2: Australian Bureau of Statistics 2008‑09 Budget measures
The ABS does not have any Budget measures for 2008‑09.
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