Outcomes of recent public consultation: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander crime data needs

Outcomes of recent public consultation: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander crime data needs

In 2019 and early 2020 the Crime Statistics Agency (CSA) undertook a community consultation about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander crime data needs with a focus on Victoria Police contact data. We give our gratitude to the many Aboriginal people who generously contributed their wisdom, experience, expertise and cultural insights during the consultation. We also thank the Koori Justice Unit, Family Safety Victoria, the Dhelk Dja and Aboriginal Justice Forums who all contributed to the outcomes of this work. 

Recent consultation

The CSA produces the official aggregate Victorian crime statistics. These statistics are derived from the administrative information recorded by Victoria Police and extracted from the Law Enforcement Assistance Program (LEAP) database. 

Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander* recorded crime data contain a significant proportion of unknown or missing values. In March 2019 the Aboriginal data quality had declined and was withdrawn from release in the public datasets. 

Victoria Police advised that an issue with the extraction of these data from LEAP may be contributing to the declining Aboriginal data quality. While Victoria Police attended to the system issue the CSA started a consultation to understand the Aboriginal crime data requirements in preparation for future Aboriginal data release.

In November 2019, after consultation with key stakeholders, the CSA sought community views about the draft Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander crime data needs paper. 

Consultation outcomes

The CSA was keen to ensure that community needs were addressed in future CSA data releases. Overall, feedback received by the CSA indicated that the draft findings were comprehensive and met their data needs. Respondents stressed the necessity for data to be made available at smaller geographic levels and to ensure that groups of interest such as youth are identifiable. These comments have been incorporated into the final paper. 

Given the high level of demand for these statistics the CSA is now developing an output strategy to incorporate these data needs into the official quarterly crime data release. It is anticipated that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander data will be released on the CSA website for the year ending 30 June 2020, scheduled for release on 24 September 2020.

Should you require any additional information relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander recorded crime statistics for Victoria, please contact us at info@crimestatistics.vic.gov.au (External link) to discuss your requirements.

*For the purposes of this page the term Aboriginal refers to the response a person has provided to Victoria Police when the Standard Indigenous Question was asked (Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander status).