Media Release - Review of NSW Police Force responses to family and domestic violence incidents

Wednesday, 14 June 2023

The NSW Law Enforcement Conduct Commission has released a report today identifying gaps in the NSW Police Force response to domestic and family violence incidents.

The Commission’s report looked at 222 complaint investigations that were linked to police responses to domestic and family violence matters and recommended police use the Commission’s review as part of its overhaul of the police response to domestic and family violence.

The Chief Commissioner of the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission Peter Johnson SC said the report highlights the scale of police work involved in responding to domestic and family violence.

“Domestic and family violence is about 40% of the work of the NSW Police Force.  

“Police attend 180,000 domestic and family violence incidents in NSW each year or about 500 incidents every day,” he said.

The report emphasised the importance of improving police record keeping about the removal of firearms as well as keeping clear records of domestic and family violence allegations and incidents made to police. 

The report urges the NSW Police Force to provide mandatory training to all general duties officers on how to better respond to domestic and family violence. 

The Commission’s review also covered the police handling of conflict of interest issues where police officers were involved in domestic and family violence incidents.

“We saw problems with the way in which police managed conflicts of interest when another police officer was said to be involved in the domestic or family violence,” the Chief Commissioner said. The Commission’s report reviewing NSW Police Force responses to domestic and family violence spanned a four year period ending in July 2021 and can be found here and a fact sheet about the Commission’s report can be found here. A video summary of the Commission’s report can be found here.  To obtain pre-recorded interview footage and grabs of the Commissioner, contact:

LECC Media Contact: Rob Schell

Mobile: 0425 317 535

Email: media@lecc.nsw.gov.au