ISSUE #9: Crime

AKA: law & order, safety, police, policing, violence in society

What this graph shows

• Victimisations per capita per month (weight adjusted for the number of days in each month).
• July 2014 onwards, which is when this data series started.

Key notes

• There is no single measure of all crime across New Zealand's recent history. ‘Victimisations (police stations)’ started in July 2014 and is regarded as the best indicator, including the recommended statistic from the NZ Police, and also their leading measure on www.policedata.nz.
• Days per month can vary from 28 to 31, affecting both the total number of crimes and the per capita crime rate in a month. All other things being equal, a 28-day February would have 9.7% fewer crimes than a 31-day month. As such, we've applied an adjustment so that months can be compared fairly, apples with apples. From July 2014, when the data began, until the latest data point, the average number of days in a month is 30.441 (3dp), so we have adjusted every month's score in the graph above to the equivalent of a 30.441-day month, e.g., 30.441/28 for February months (except leap years, which have 29 days) and 30.441/31 for December months.
• External factors can influence these results, and context is important, but governments are ultimately accountable for New Zealand's performance.
• Remember that each Labour-led or National-led government has had coalition partners that share in their successes and failures. A full list of governments for this time range is at the bottom of this page.

Data sources

• Victimisations (police stations) = https://www.police.govt.nz/about-us/statistics-and-publications/data-and-statistics/victimisations-police-stations > Trends > Bottom RHS graph > Download in the bottom RH corner
• Population = https://infoshare.stats.govt.nz > Browse > Population > Population Estimates - DPE > Estimated Resident Population (Mean Quarter Ended) by Sex (1991+) (Qrtly-Mar/Jun/Sep/Dec) [You will need to divide the quarterly population growth figures into each of the 3 months to get monthly population estimates, and make estimates if the latest quarterly data has not been released yet.]

Data timing

• Frequency: Monthly
• Updated: 2-month delay for victimisation data (1-month for offender data) and published on the last working day of each month
• Last update: Aug 2026 = 30 Oct 2026
• Next update: Sep 2026 = 30 Nov 2026

Why this KPI?

• There is no single measure of all crime in New Zealand over time.
• The most reliable long-term indicator available is Victimisations (police stations), as advised by the NZ Police, and this is also their lead statistic on www.policedata.nz. It also began in July 2014 so has a longer time series than other measures, and is updated monthly (with a two-month delay).
• This dataset records each time a crime is reported to police and a victim file is opened.
• It focuses on person-centred crime in society.
• It captures the major “visible” offences that most people associate with crime, under these five ANZSOC (Australian and New Zealand Standard Offence Classification) Divisions:
  • Acts Intended to Cause Injury (Assault)
  • Sexual Assault and Related Offences
  • Abduction, Harassment and Other Related Offences Against a Person
  • Robbery, Extortion and Related Offences
  • Theft and Related Offences
• The NZ Police make the “Note: Burglary victimisations are classified to property rather than the resident and have been excluded from the data”.
• Several ANZSOC Divisions are excluded from the victimisation data, often due to very small sample sizes, e.g., murders, no 3rd-party victims, e.g., speeding tickets, or victim counts being hard to identify, e.g., fraud. These include:
  • Homicide and Related Offences
  • Dangerous or Negligent Acts Endangering Persons
  • Fraud, Deception and Related Offences
  • Miscellaneous Offences
  • Offences Against Justice Procedures, Govt Sec and Gov Ops
  • Property Damage and Environmental Pollution
  • Public Order Offences
  • Traffic and Vehicle Regulatory Offences
  • Prohibited and Regulated Weapons and Explosive Devices [unlikely to have victims]
• Two important caveats from the NZ Police:
  • ‘The Ministry of Justice survey shows that only about 25% [of crime] is reported and with varying degree across different crime types.”
  • ‘The 'Victimisations (police stations)' report has the complete dataset from July 2014.’
• Proceedings data (AKA offender-based crime statistics) can't be used as it only record crimes where an offender is identified and processed. That’s a much smaller number, e.g., in July 2026 Victimisations (police stations) was 28,112, whereas Proceedings (police stations) was only 9,757 (~1/3 as many). Proceedings are also impacted by policy changes to deprioritise certain crimes, e.g., shoplifting could be increasing while shoplifting proceedings decrease as resources are focused elsewhere.
• All other reports start too late to be as useful, e.g., 2019-2020, and also don't count all crimes.

Related facts

Some of these articles contain historical data and analysis that may not have been updated since publication. Please check the dates when interpreting the findings.

• Poll on Three Strikes
• Victims of crime by ethnicity and sex
• Offender demographics by ethnicity and sex
• Aggravated retail robberies
• Crime Prevention Fund installations (2022)
• Drugs in wastewater testing

Wishlist

With support, we’ll be able to add multiple KPIs for each issue:

• Updates on many of the KPIs listed above.
• NGL (National Gang List) total (older data here)
• Murder convictions (older data here)
• Police staff per capita (frontline vs. back office)
• Domestic violence
• Child abuse
• Prisoners per capita (needs to be paired with crime rates)
• Cases > Arrests > Charges > Convictions (per capita and then %s)
• Average sentences (by offence class)
• Reoffending
• Retail crime (hard to measure)
• Youth crime

Governments over the timeframe shown

• 2014 = National + ACT, United, Māori
  
  
• 2017 = Labour/NZ First + Green
  2020 = Labour + Green

• 2023 = National/ACT/NZ First

/ = Coalition partners
+ = Other formal governing agreements, including confidence and supply, support and cooperation.

Sources:1,2 (table 5).

© Copyright

Data published by NZ Police, Stats NZ
© Crown Copyright
Licensed for use under the creative commons attribution licence (BY) 4.0

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