Home Safety and Security

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    NAME OF ORGANISATION
    Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)

    OVERVIEW
    Home Safety and Security, Western Australia is a one-off survey conducted in October 2004 as a supplement to the Monthly Population Survey. It collects data from households in a private sample of private dwellings and provides information on household safety, household security and household property crime.

    Topics covered include: whether smoke alarms are installed, whether the dwelling has security features such as deadlocks on doors, security screens, a burglar alarm and whether the household experienced a break-in or attempted break-in. For households which have experienced a break-in or attempted break-in, the survey collects information about the security features of the dwelling at the time of the incident and the characteristics of the break-in or attempted break-in such as point of entry, time of day, day of week.

    PURPOSE

    Ensuring Western Australians are safe and secure in their homes is a key priority for the Western Australian government. The government is therefore interested in undertaking research into the safety measures householders take to protect themselves and their homes from fire and emergencies; and the security features that householders install to protect their homes from household property crime.
    In particular:

      • whether smoke alarms are installed;
      • whether household has an emergency evacuation plan;
      • what security features are installed;
      • the incidence of household property crime for homes with different levels of security;
      • for households which have experienced household property crime, the characteristics of the home break-in or attempted home break-in such as point of entry, time of day, day of week.

    This information will assist the government to develop safety programs, particularly targeting specific types of households at greatest risk in emergencies and to set and promote minimum security standards for public and private housing to reduce the incidence of household property crime.

    SCOPE
    The HSS survey was conducted as a supplement to the ABS Monthly Population Survey (MPS) in October 2004. It was conducted on a subset of the full sample of private dwellings in WA that were included in the MPS. It covered all persons who were usual residents of private dwellings except:
      • members of the Australian permanent defence forces;
      • certain diplomatic personnerl of overseas governments, customarily excluded from censuses and surveys;
      • overseas residents in Australia;
      • members on non-Australian defence forces (and their dependents) stationed in Australia; and
      • persons living in sparsely settled areas of WA.

    Coverage rules were applied to ensure that each person was associated with only one dwelling, and hence had only one chance of selection in the survey.


    DATA DETAIL

    Conceptual framework
    Not applicable

    Main outputs
    Households: household safety measures (smoke alarms/detectors, evacuation plans), household security features (deadlocks, security screens, window locks, security/burglar alarms, sensor lights), household property crime (point of entry, time of day, day of week of the home break-in and/or attempted break-in), household security features (at the time of the incident), by household composition, dwelling tenure, dwelling structure and other dwelling characteristics.

    Classifications
    Relevant ABS, National and/or International classifications and standards will be used. Where these are not available, the survey will aim for consistency with other ABS surveys.

    Other concepts (summary)
    Not applicable

    GEOGRAPHIC DETAIL
    Western Australia
    Major Statistical Region
    Statistical Region

    Comments and/or Other Regions
    Not applicable

    COLLECTION FREQUENCY
    Once Only

    Frequency comments


    COLLECTION HISTORY
    One-off state supplementary survey

    DATA AVAILABILITY
    Yes

    Data availability comments

    Data will be available in the publication Home Safety and Security, Western Australia (ABS Cat No. 4526.5.55.001). Additional data will be available on request as a chargeable service.


    DATE OF LAST UPDATE FOR THIS DOCUMENT
    05/04/2005 10:59 AM