Media Release
Embargoed until 00:01 a.m. (AEST) Thursday 24 September 2026
A new Sentencing Advisory Council report finds prison sentences for certain serious offences have gotten longer in a recent 10-year period, at least in part due to the introduction of standard sentences in the Sentencing Act in early 2018.
Released today, the report examines sentencing practices in Victoria over the 10 years to 30 June 2024 to identify the effect of ‘standard sentences’: numerical guideposts that represent the middle of the range of seriousness for an offence. Standard sentences apply to certain serious offences – including murder, culpable driving causing death, trafficking a large commercial quantity of drugs and various sex offences – if committed on or after 1 February 2018. Courts must take the standard sentence into account when sentencing a standard sentence offence. For example, the maximum penalty for rape is 25 years’ imprisonment, and the standard sentence is 10 years.
The aims of introducing standard sentences were to promote consistency in sentencing and increase the lengths of prison terms to align more closely with community expectations.
The report’s first key finding is that imprisonment lengths for almost all the standard sentence offences increased over time. For instance, the median prison sentence increased from 21 years to 24 years for murder, from 6 years to 7 years for rape, and from 7 years to 11 years for the trafficking offence.
The second key finding is that standard sentences appear to have contributed to those increases. Using regression modelling for three offences (murder, rape and trafficking a large commercial quantity of drugs), the report finds there were numerous factors associated with longer prison sentences for these three offences. For example, the murder of a former intimate partner was associated with longer prison sentences compared to murdering an acquaintance. Notably, just one factor was significantly associated with longer prison sentences for all three offences, and that was whether the standard sentence applied.
The third key finding is how much standard sentences increased prison sentence lengths. In cases where the standard sentence applied, prison sentences were approximately 1 year and 2 months longer for rape, 1 year and 10 months longer for murder, and 2 years and 3 months longer for trafficking a large commercial quantity of drugs.
Despite these increases, the report also finds the vast majority (at least 85%) of prison sentences for all but two standard sentence offences were shorter than the applicable standard sentence. For instance, the standard sentence for incest is 10 years, and 86% of incest offences received a sentence shorter than 10 years. This is almost certainly because of the way standard sentences operate. The Court of Appeal has clarified that the standard sentence is ‘but one factor’ courts have to consider in deciding an appropriate sentence (Brown v The Queen [2019] VSCA 286, [106]). Other factors, such as whether the offender pleaded guilty or has a mental impairment, still have an important role to play.
The two offences where sentence lengths tended to be closer to the standard sentence were the two homicide offences:
- the standard sentence for culpable driving causing death is 8 years and the median sentence was also 8 years
- the standard sentence for murder is 25 years and the median sentence was 24 years.
Sentence lengths for these two homicide offences were already close to their standard sentences before standard sentences were introduced, whereas sentence lengths for the other offences were much shorter than their applicable standard sentence.
Overall, the report finds that standard sentences appear to have achieved one of their main aims, which was to increase the lengths of prison sentences for relevant offences.
Quotes Attributable to Sentencing Advisory Council Director Stan Winford
‘This is the first report to examine the effect of introducing standard sentences in Victoria in 2018. The findings show that while standard sentences are just one factor that courts have to take into account, their introduction has meaningfully increased the lengths of prison sentences for serious crimes.’
The report, The Effect of Introducing Standard Sentences in Victoria, will be available on the Council’s website at www.sentencingcouncil.vic.gov.au on 24 September 2026.
About the Sentencing Advisory Council: the Council is an independent statutory body established in 2004. It has a number of legislative functions, including conducting research on sentencing, consulting on sentencing matters, publishing sentencing statistics, and advising the Attorney-General on sentencing matters.
