Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people are not overrepresented in the criminal justice system.

By 2031, reduce the rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people (10–17 years) in detention by at least 30%.

Proportion of young alleged offenders (10–17 years) involved in police proceedings including charges and summons, cautions, diversions.

There are four measures for this indicator.

Measure 1 is the rate of young people proceeded against by police, defined as:

Numerator – number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years proceeded against by police

Denominator – number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years

and is presented as a rate per 10,000 young people.

Measure 2 is the proportion of young people proceeded against by police, by the number of times proceeded against, defined as:

Numerator – number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years proceeded against by police, by times proceeded against (one, two, or three or more times)

Denominator – number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years proceeded against by police

and is presented as a percentage.

Measure 3 is the average (mean) number of times young people are proceeded against by police, defined as:

Numerator – number of police proceedings against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years

Denominator – number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years proceeded against by police

and is presented as a number.

Measure 4 is the proportion of police proceedings against young people that are court actions, defined as:

Numerator – number of police proceedings against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years, by method of proceeding (court/non‑court action)

Denominator – number of police proceedings against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people aged 10–17 years

and is presented as a percentage.

Contextual information will be reported on the proportion of offenders for whom Indigenous status is reported as unknown/not stated.

National Agreement on Closing the Gap July 2020

31 July 2024

Driver

Measure 1: a low or decreasing rate is desirable.

Measure 2: a low or decreasing proportion proceeded against multiple times is desirable.

Measure 3: a low or decreasing average (mean) number is desirable.

Measure 4: a low or decreasing proportion is desirable.

Measures 2, 3, 4 and numerator for Measure 1

Name: Recorded Crime – Offenders

Frequency: Annual

Documentation (links): https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/crime-and-justice/recorded-crime-offenders

Denominator for Measure 1

Name: Estimates and projections for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population

Frequency: Annual (data revised on a five‑yearly basis)

Documentation: https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-peoples/estimates-and-projections-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-australians

Measure 2, 3, 4 and numerator for Measure 1

Provider name: Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)

Provider area: National Centre for Crime and Justice Statistics

Denominator for Measure 1

Provider name: Australian Bureau of Statistics

Provider area: Demography

2018-19

2022-23

State and territory and Australia, by Indigenous status.

Measure 1: Numerator divided by Denominator multiplied by 10, 000.

Measure 2: Numerator divided by Denominator multiplied by 100.

Measure 3: Numerator divided by Denominator.

Measure 4: Numerator divided by Denominator multiplied by 100.

Counting rules

‘People proceeded against by police’ represents a person aged 10 years or over who is proceeded against and recorded by police for one or more criminal offences. An offender is only counted once during the reference period irrespective of the number of offences committed or the number of separate occasions that police proceeded against that offender.

‘Police proceedings’ represent a count for each separate occasion within the 12‑month reference period that police initiate a legal action against an alleged offender.

The number of young people proceeded against and the total number of proceedings cannot be used to derive the average (mean) times proceeded against for offenders. The average (mean) times proceeded against measure is a specific count at the offender level on how many occasions ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander’ and ‘non-Indigenous’ young offenders came into contact with police during the reference year and this does not match the data held for the count of proceedings for ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander’ and ‘non-Indigenous’ young offenders. These do not align for a number of reasons; for example a person may:

• be aged 17 years when first proceeded against but some proceedings occur when they were 18 years and these are excluded from the proceedings count (as scope is 0–17 years)
• be counted as 'Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander' as an offender but have one or more proceedings coded as 'Non‑Indigenous' because all of the offences making up those proceedings have a 'Non‑Indigenous' Indigenous status code in that data set
• have several proceedings that are penalty notices but a principal person method of proceeding of 'Court action'. These notices are included in the 'number of times proceeded against' in the offender count but excluded from the proceedings count.

Court actions by police include the following ABS codes:

• 110 Charge and bail/remand
• 120 Charge and summons
• 190 Other court action, not elsewhere classified.

Non-court actions by police include the following ABS codes:

• 210 Informal caution or informal warning
• 220 Formal caution or formal warning
• 230 Conference
• 240 Counselling (includes drug diversion schemes)
• 250 Penalty notices
• 290 Other non-court action, not elsewhere classified.

Exclusions (all measures):

People/proceedings with an unknown or not stated Indigenous status (these are reported separately)

Offenders with a penalty notice as their principal method of proceeding.

Data values have been randomly adjusted using perturbation to avoid the release of confidential data. Discrepancies may occur between sums of the component items and totals.

The quality of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identification varies across jurisdictions. Data are only available by Indigenous status for New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory. Based on an ABS assessment, Indigenous status data for other states are not of sufficient quality and/or do not meet ABS standards for national reporting. Due to data quality issues, data are not available for method of police proceeding (i.e. court/non-court proceedings) for South Australia and the Northern Territory.

Caution should be used when comparing Indigenous status data across states and territories or time periods, due to variations in the proportion of offenders with unknown Indigenous status.

Future reporting will seek to include the following additional disaggregations:

• geographic area (remoteness, other geographic categories where available)
• socio‑economic status of the locality
• gender
• age (10–13 years old, 14–17 years old).