'Alarming': Hunter rates of domestic violence and AVO breaches spike

The staggering increase does not reflect the full picture, Hunter DFV Consortium regional collaborations coordinator Lisa Ronneberg said, only capturing incidents which are reported to police.

"This data represents people who live in our communities, and the victim-survivors of these crimes are overwhelmingly women and children," she said.

"We know there is a significant number of DFV (domestic and family violence) victim-survivors who do not report to the police, so the actual rates in our region are much higher."

Cessnock topped the region for domestic violence related assault, where rates of DV related assault are up 42.6 per cent in the two years from April 2022 to March 2024.

In the same time period, AVO breaches jumped by 62.1 per cent.

The five-year trend was just as concerning, with DV related assaults growing by 16.4 per cent from April 2019 to March 2024 and AVO breaches by 17.2 per cent.

The Hunter DFV Consortium has called on NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookey to increase funding to specialist DFV and homelessness services in the Hunter in next week's State Budget.

The consortium outlined their priorities in a pre-budget submission earlier this year, and have since met with Minister for Prevention of Domestic Violence Jodie Harrison, Minister for Housing and Homelessness Rose Jackson and several Hunter MPs urging them to help tackle the problem.

In Muswellbrook, DV related assaults spiked by 27.8 per cent in the two-year period, while the number of AVO breaches remained stable.

Port Stephens Family and Neighbourhood Services manager Sue Pollock said her service, like all those in the consortium, is extremely overwhelmed and under-resourced.

"It's way past time to prioritise women and children's safety in our country," she said.

"We've seen a 28 per cent increase in DFV related assault in Port Stephens over the past 2 years."

Ms Pollock said the latest BOCSAR report is alarming, but unfortunately not surprising.

"We are very aware that incidents of DFV assaults are increasing in our region, as we see this reflected in the number of people coming through our doors every day," she said.

"Many of whom will not be captured in those statistics as the violence has not been reported to police due to fear of increasing risk if the perpetrator of violence finds that out."

In Newcastle and Maitland, the two-year trend showed rates of DV related assault remained stable, while in Singleton they were up by 25 per cent and 9.4 per cent in Lake Macquarie.

In the 12 months to March 2024, Newcastle police responded to 768 call outs for domestic violence, while Lake Macquarie police responded to 863 incidents in the same period.

Carrie's Place acting chief executive Ange Kiley said the consortium is calling on the NSW Premier and Treasurer to make this the year that the state government significantly invests in DFV support and prevention services.

"If they don't, we will continue to see the already astonishingly high rates of DFV increase in our region," she said.

Minister for the Prevention of Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Jodie Harrison said an increase in assaults in the Hunter is "unacceptable".

"The status quo is not good enough," she said.

"We took urgent action recently announcing a $230 million emergency package that includes funding for crisis responses and frontline services."

Ms Harrison said the state government is putting a greater focus on primary prevention to stop domestic, family and sexual violence before it begins.

She said $38 million from the emergency package has been allocated to implement NSW's first dedicated Primary Prevention Strategy.

"This is just the first phase of our response and we will be working with the sector to deliver fit-for-purpose responses as we work towards reducing domestic and family violence in our state," she said.

In Newcastle this week, Member for Newcastle Sharon Claydon said the national scourge of violence against women is something everyone should take seriously.

"This is a huge epidemic of mostly male violence that occurs in Australia, and there is, the government has invested a $3.4 billion package around women's safety," she said.

"So, locally for us it's investing in a specialised primary health service at the moment where we've just finished trialling on the Central Coast where the recent budget is extended to that program so that we can run that over another five sites.

"We'll have one here in the Newcastle area and perhaps other parts of the Hunter where we've seen those alarming rates of domestic violence."