The battle over the right of Australian car owners to choose who repairs their cars goes bush in Victoria with Senator Ricky Muir meeting with independent repairers in Warragul on Thursday.

The meeting, organised by the Australian Automotive Aftermarket Association (AAAA), is part of an ongoing campaign to highlight the lack of access to information and data from car manufacturers to independent repairers in favour of dealership linked repair workshops.

AAAA Executive Director, Stuart Charity said, "This is particularly hard on car owners who live in regional and rural Australia where dealerships do not exist and in some instances forces people to drive hundreds kilometres for vehicle service."

In an average three-month period, 43% of Australian motorists (or 6,484,000 people) take their main vehicle to a professional for some kind of service or repairs.

When it comes to routine services, consumers choose traditional automotive garage/workshops (42%) and the dealer where the motorist bought their vehicle in the first place (29%) ....Roy Morgan Research 2015.

Mr Charity said this research underpins the need for the Turnbull Government, with bipartisan support, to develop a National Automotive Repair and Servicing Portal which can be accessed on a pay for use basis by both independent and dealer workshops.

"The issue is expected to hit flashpoint early in February in Federal Parliament with Senator Muir set to introduce a Private Senator's Bill to establish a mandatory portal for data sharing (like in most countries globally) where repairers can access the appropriate repair and service data for a reasonable cost if the Federal Government fails to move."

At the time Senator Muir said "As our vehicles become more computerised traditional methods of servicing, tuning and repairing become harder, to near impossible to complete without the appropriate passwords and codes.

"When purchasing a vehicle the consumer is buying a product to own and should not be held to ransom by car companies withholding vital information needed for the repair and service of that vehicle. This reduces competition and is detrimental to the future of independent repairers."

Mr Charity said "Currently there is no guarantee that tens of thousands of independent mechanics in the automotive repair and servicing industry across the nation, not aligned to dealerships, can access basic information from manufacturers of behalf of millions of Australian vehicle owners."

Media Enquiries:
Ron Smith, Corporate Media Communications, AAAA - Mobile: 0417 329 201