Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and households are safe.

By 2031, the rate of all forms of family violence and abuse against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women and children is reduced at least by 50%, as progress towards zero.

Proportion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women reporting family violence is common in their communities.

There are two measures for this indicator.

Measure 1 is the proportion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women aged 16 years or over who agree that ‘violence against women is common in Australia’

Numerator – number of respondents who are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women aged 16 years or over who agree that ‘violence against women is common in Australia’

Denominator – number of respondents who are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women aged 16 years or over

and is presented as a percentage.

Measure 2 is the proportion of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women aged 16 years or over who agree that ‘violence against women is common in the suburb or town where you live’

Numerator – number of respondents Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women aged 16 years or over who agree that ‘violence against women is common in the suburb or town where you live’

Denominator – number of respondents who are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women aged 16 years or over

and is presented as a percentage.

National Agreement on Closing the Gap July 2020

12 March 2025

Driver

A low or decreasing proportion is desirable, as it may indicate a lower incidence of family violence. However, while higher agreement with these questions can indicate higher actual rates of violence, it may also reflect greater awareness of violence against women and greater acknowledgement that it is a problem.

Name: The National Community Attitudes towards Violence against Women Survey (NCAS)

Frequency: Periodic

Documentation (links): https://www.anrows.org.au/research-program/ncas/

Provider name: Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (ANROWS) Limited

2021

2021

Selected states and territories (New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and the Northern Territory) and Australia

Numerator divided by Denominator multiplied by 100.

The 2021 NCAS uses the term "woman" to refer to a respondent's gender identity and how they respond to the question "How do you describe your gender."

There is currently no nationally representative data available on the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women reporting that family violence is common in their communities.

The NCAS is a national survey that collects data on people’s understanding of violence against women, their attitudes towards it, what influences their attitudes, and if there has been a change over time. In 2021, the NCAS included two questions asking survey participants whether ‘violence against women is a problem in’:

• ‘Australia’, and
• ‘the suburb or town where you live’.

These questions were designed for all Australians, not specifically for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and therefore, they refer to “violence against women” not “family violence”. They also ask about violence against women, not specifically against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women.

An Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander Advisory Group (AG) was formed to provide guidance on the 2021 NCAS. The AG included Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander professionals from various First Nations who have a range of expertise in family, domestic and sexual violence, including in qualitative and quantitative research, sociology, social work, psychology, public health, law and justice, policy and service provision. For more information on the AG’s role for the 2021 NCAS, please see: Attitudes matter: The 2021 National Community Attitudes towards Violence against Women Survey (NCAS), Findings for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander respondents.

Due to the small sample of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women who were asked these questions (n=248), the results should not be used to draw conclusions at the national or state and territory level. The NCAS is unlikely to be fully representative of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples across Australia, and therefore cannot be used to:

• compare results over time across different Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander samples
• generalise the 2021 findings to the broader Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population.

ANROWS has suppressed the data for Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory (reported as np) due to the small number of respondents in those jurisdictions. All suppressed data has been included in the totals. Proportions have been rounded to the nearest whole number and as a result sum of components may not add to 100%.

Future reporting will seek to include the following additional disaggregations:

• all states/territories (currently only available for New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and the Northern Territory)
• remoteness areas and other small geographic areas (where available)
• disability status
• age
• Indigenous status (comparable data on non‑Indigenous people is currently not available).