NSW REGISTRY OF BIRTHS, DEATHS AND MARRIAGES, BIRTHS COLLECTION
INTRODUCTION
1 The Births Collection is administered by the NSW Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages. It records the details of births in NSW.
2 This dataset is the collection used by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) in the compilation of Births, Australia (cat. no. 3301.0) and is also used in the calculation of official population estimates. Registration of a birth is required by law, and must be completed for a birth certificate to be issued (a necessary document to establish identity being used to enrol in educational institutions, open bank accounts, apply for passports, etc).
3 The authority to collect this information is legislated in the Births, Deaths & Marriages Registration Act 1995.
4 Information is collected on the details of the birth, the mother and father, their marriage, previous children from this relationship, and children of the mother from other relationships.
5 In this product, data are presented on births by age of mother and fertility rates.
SCOPE
6 The scope of this collection is births to women who usually reside in NSW, and births to women who were overseas residents but were in NSW at the time of birth and thus registered the birth in NSW.
7 The coverage of this collection is all births registered by at least one parent. It is known that there are some births which are not registered. However, these are small in number.
REFERENCE PERIOD
8 The reference period is calendar years.
KEY DATA ITEMS
9 The following key data items from the Births collection relate to data used in this product.
10 Birth: The delivery of a child, irrespective of the duration of pregnancy, who, after being born, breathes or shows any evidence of life such as heartbeat.
11 Local Government Area (LGA) of usual residence: The LGA of usual residence refers to the LGA of usual residence of the mother during the majority of her pregnancy.
12 Total fertility rate: The sum of age-specific fertility rates (live births at each age of mother per female population of that age). It represents the number of children a female would bear during her lifetime if she experienced current age-specific fertility rates at each age of her reproductive life.
GEOGRAPHY
13 The 2004 Australian Standard Geographical Classification (ASGC) (cat. no. 1216.0) is used in the coding of this collection. Data are available by Statistical Local Area (SLA) of usual residence. Within this report, SLA data has been aggregated to Local Government Area.
COLLECTION METHODOLOGY
14 The registration of births is the responsibility of state and territory Registrars of Births, Deaths and Marriages and is based on an information form completed by a parent of the child.
15 This form is the basis of the data provided to the ABS, by Registrars, for compilation of the aggregate statistics in the births publication. Most data items are collected in all states and territories, and therefore statistics at the national level are available for most characteristics. Some states also collect additional information.
ACCURACY
16 There is usually an interval between the occurrence and registration of a birth, and as a result of delay in registration, some births occurring in one year are not registered until the following year, or even later. This delay can be caused by either a delay by the parents or Registrar in registering the birth.
17 For births data, cell values less than three have been suppressed to protect confidentiality.
PUBLISHED DATA
18 The publication Births, Australia (cat. no. 3301.0) is released around November each year.
UNPUBLISHED DATA
19 Unpublished data are available via a consultancy from the ABS. For further information, please contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070.
RELATED WEB SITES
20 The NSW Registry of Births, Deaths & Marriages web site can be found at <www.bdm.nsw.gov.au>.
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