Coercive control

What is coercive control?

Coercive control is an ongoing and repeated pattern of behaviour used to control or dominate another person. It can be behaviour that:

• isolates
• manipulates
• threatens
• hurts (including physically or sexually)
• scares
• humiliates
• harasses
• monitors or stalks.

Coercive control can happen in any type of relationship. It can happen with an intimate partner, including after a relationship ends. It can also happen between family members, people residing together or in a carer relationship.

From 1 July 2024, coercive control towards a current or former intimate partner will be criminalised in NSW. The new criminal offence is called ‘abusive behaviour towards current or former intimate partners’. The law will only apply to abusive behaviour that occurred after 1 July 2024. The behaviour must have been engaged in within New South Wales but may also include conduct in other jurisdictions.

What is abusive behaviour towards a current or former intimate partner?

Abusive behaviour involves:

• violence or threats of violence
• intimidation
• coercion or control of a person.

Abusive behaviour may include engaging in, or threatening to engage in, behaviour that:

• causes harm to a child if a person fails to comply with demands
• causes harm to the person, or another adult, if the person fails to comply with demands
• is economically or financially abusive, such as:
  • withholding financial support where a person is dependent on the financial support
  • preventing or restricting a person from seeking employment
  • preventing or restricting a person from accessing or controlling their income or assets, including joint income or assets
• shames, degrades or humiliates a person
• directly or indirectly harasses a person, or monitors or tracks a person’s activities, communications or movements, whether by physically following the person, using technology or in another way
• causes damage to or destruction of property
• prevents the person from doing any of the following or otherwise isolates the person:
  • making or keeping connections with the person’s family, friends or culture
  • participating in cultural or spiritual ceremonies or practice
  • expressing the person’s cultural identity
• causes injury or death to an animal
• deprives a person of liberty, restricts a person’s liberty or unreasonably controls or regulates a person’s day-to-day activities, including:
  • making unreasonable demands about how a person uses personal, social or sexual autonomy and making threats of negative consequences for failing to comply with the demands
  • denying a person access to basic necessities including food, clothing or sleep
  • withholding necessary medical or other care, support, aids, equipment or essential support services or making a person take medication or undertake medical procedures.

Responding to an abusive behaviour charge

At court you will need to tell the court if you are pleading guilty or not guilty. You might have other options too, like negotiating with the police or making a Section 14 application (a mental health application).

If you plead ‘guilty’, you will be sentenced. You will be given time to make submissions about your personal circumstances and share any documents.

If you plead ‘not guilty’, the police will provide you with all the evidence they have against you before the hearing date. If there is video evidence, such as CCTV footage or a video statement, you may be able to view this at the police station before the court date. You will need to speak to police to arrange this.

For more information on going to court for an abusive behaviour charge, see Going to court.

If you have been charged with abusive behaviour, you should get legal advice.

What do the police need to prove?

If you go to court and plead not guilty to a charge of abusive behaviour towards a current or former intimate partner, police must prove:

• you engaged in a course of conduct against a person that consisted of abusive behaviour
• at the time, you were at least 18 years old
• at the time, you and the other person were or had been intimate partners
• your actions were intended to coerce or control the other person
• a reasonable person would consider the course of conduct would be likely to cause:
  • fear that violence would be used against the other person or another person, and/or
  • a serious adverse impact on the capacity of the other person to engage in some or all of their ordinary day-to-day activities.

The police do not have to prove that harm was actually caused to the other person but that a reasonable person would consider that your behaviour would be likely to cause fear or harm.

Unless the police can prove all these things, the court must find you not guilty.

It is a defence to the charge if the course of conduct was reasonable in all the circumstances.

If you have been charged, you should get legal advice. 

What is a course of conduct?

Coercive control is more than a single act or instance of abusive behaviour. It involves a course of conduct that consists of abusive behaviour. A course of conduct means engaging in behaviour:

• either repeatedly or continuously, or
• both repeatedly and continuously.