'Record' car sales crash was just a statistical 'muddle'

"The decline in the British car market has been greatly exaggerated," says The Times.

Last month the industry trade body, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), published figures showing a record fall in used car sales in June of a whopping 13.5 per cent.

But in "one of the biggest muddles in industry statistics in recent times" the society has been forced to withdraw that announcement and issue a sheepish "update" on the figures that reveal the drop was only 0.7 per cent.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

That means used car sales for the first six months of the year were ahead of the same period in 2016 by 1.3 per cent.

"There was a problem with the system, an issue with the algorithms," a spokesman said. The Times added the problem was with the SMMT's analysis of raw data from the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency.

The more positive numbers for second-hand car sales come on the same day that the SMMT published figures on car production in July that reveal factories have "stepped up a gear" as several new models hit production lines.

"Just over 136,000 vehicles were made in British factories, up 7.8 per cent on July last year," says the BBC.

New car production is down over the first seven months of the year as a whole, by around 6.5 per cent. That was predicted at the start of the year and follows several years of rising sales to record levels.

SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes said: "As long as the economic conditions at home and abroad stay broadly stable, we expect new car production to remain in line with expectations for the rest of 2017."