The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) said yesterday that the country's overall sales of new motor vehicles jumped by 8.4 percent in April with four-wheel drive units posting a record 28.7 percent increase in sales in the year leading to April.

ABS said that the April vehicles sales so far is the biggest monthly surge for almost a decade with Western Australia experiencing sales spikes of up to 26.7 in April, en route to an annual 47 percent rise in sales.

CommSec economist Savanth Sebastian affirmed that the April figures came second only to sales recorded in December 2000, which saw then a rise of 15.3 percent, as he added that there are "signs that the car industry will remain quite strongly supported over the next few months."

He said that tax breaks extended by the government to businesses contributed to the sterling performance of the vehicle industry with better job security as further encouragement for Australians to buy cars and SUVs.

Mr Sebastian is confident that the trend will continue throughout the year as he cited that "passenger car sales will really be the driver for the industry, especially over the second half of this year."

ABS data showed that up to 90,935 units were rolled out by car dealers in April as compared to sales figures of 83,876 units in March, which Mr Sebastian attributed to better car affordability with "reasonable tax breaks playing a bit part in the data."

He also said that growth in the resources sector, specifically in WA area, has buoyed vehicle purchases and many of the vehicles bought at the end of last year were now being delivered, strongly suggesting that "businesses are quietly confident that things are improving."

Mr Sebastian observed that the country is not only witnessing "quite strong sales in December, but it's still had a flow on effect that's working its way through in the subsequent months."