Crime rates are still rising in Ballarat, despite other parts of regional Victoria seeing a fall.
That’s according to the latest data from the state’s Crime Statistics Agency, released yesterday (Thursday, March 19th).
Figures show that in the year to December 2025, the City saw 10,856 criminal incidents recorded by police, a rise of around 7.7 percent compared 2024’s figure of 9,508.
The number of offences reported also increased by 7.4 percent, to 14,481.
This marks the sixth consecutive year that Ballarat’s crime rate has risen, with 11,695.2 offences recorded for every 100 thousand people.
That number is far higher than the statewide average of 6,668.6 per 100k people, through remarkably still below several other regional council areas like Shepparton, Mildura and Horsham.
Breaching a Family Violence Order was the most common offence to occur in Ballarat with 1,778 incidents reported, followed by stealing from a motor vehicle (1,696) and criminal damage (1,174).
Across Victoria, the number of criminal incidents reported went up by four percent, and the number of offences by 4.2 percent.
Pyrenees Shire experienced a much sharper rise of 12.1 percent, while Ararat and Hepburn Shire saw a slight fall in their crime rates.
In response to the figures, State Minister for Police and Community Safety, Anthony Carbines said any crime being committed was “unacceptable”.
“There’s more work to do to keep the community safe, but we can already see that our tougher bail laws are working, and offending by young males is now falling,” Mr Carbines said.
“There are too many victims in the community, but that is why we’ve delivered Adult Time for Violent Crime [policies], toughened bail laws, and backed Victoria Police with more powers.”
