The market share of fleet sales has been squeezed by private buyers in the best March for new car sales in 10 years.

Fleet and business registrations during March were 13.5% and 23.4% higher respectively than during the same period in 2013, and are running 8.7% and 18.2% higher for the year to date, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT).

But while fleet and business regitrations took a combined 51.3% share of the market in the first quarter of 2013, it has fallen to 49.4% for the first three months of 2014 as private registrations take the dominant share.

The total new car market of 464,824 in March was just 2,130 units short of the best ever March total in 2004.

The Ford Fiesta continues to dominate the top 10 overall registrations in March, with the Ford Focus beating the Vauxhall Corsa to third place. The Nissan Qashqai was the fourth most popular C-sector car, behind Ford Focus, Vauxhall Astra and Volkswagen Golf, while the most popular D-sector car in March was the BMW 3 Series.

Compared with March 2004, the SMMT says average car CO2 emissions based on registrations has fallen by 26%. More than two thirds of cars registered in March had CO2 emissions of less than 130g/km compared with 6.5% in March 2004.