The latest crime statistics are out and, as usual, they can be a little baffling to comprehend at a first glance.

So what has actually been happening with crime across Victoria and what are police doing about it?

The overall rate of criminal incidents, when weighed against the state's population, has decreased by 0.8 per cent.

But the full picture is a little more complex.

Home invasions and carjackings

There were 224 alleged home invasions and 294 carjackings in the 12-month period ending June 30, which represented an increase on the previous year's numbers in both categories.

There were 208 home invasions and about 224 carjackings in the previous year, police said.

Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Shane Patton said crimes in which people suddenly found themselves face-to-face with an intruder in their home, or had their car violently stolen from them in the street, were an "absolute priority" for the force.

"We know they are crimes that the public are very frightened of and rightly so," the deputy commissioner said.

He said a significant number of robberies were happening in the city's outer suburbs, in the south-east near Dandenong, and the west near Caroline Springs.

A new team in Caroline Springs was working to target youth involved in high-impact, high-harm crimes, he said.

That team had produced significant results with the arrest of 37 "high-priority offenders" in their first few weeks of operation.

Deputy Commissioner Patton said police were now working more closely with other agencies to address the underlying issues driving youth offending.

"Engaging with them, getting them back into jobs, getting them back into schools, getting them engaged with youth workers, getting them assistance for the issues they have whether it be drugs, anger or whatever," he said.

Youth offending 'crime sprees'

Deputy Commissioner Patton said the opportunistic nature of carjackings and aggravated burglaries made them difficult to police.

Officers were also seeing those crimes form part of "sprees", in which offenders embarked on sometimes days-long periods of offending until they were caught.

"They actually go on a spree until we stop them. It's like a carjacking here, an aggravated burglary here and it's over several days," Deputy Commissioner Patton said.

He cited an incident in Geelong overnight in which he alleged two police cars were rammed and an officer suffered a fractured leg. He said the two teenagers involved had been on a "crime spree" for five days, which included high-speed chases, theft and robbery.

He said some Victorian youth offenders were repeat offenders but there were also some moving from no offending to high-harm offences.

"You can't go and target a youth who is actually not on your radar," he said.

Police Minister Lisa Neville added police had adopted new tactics to try to better disrupt offenders who were otherwise undeterred by the prospect of a prison term.

Separately, Deputy Commissioner Patton said while it was not an official statistic, police felt there was "virtually" one ramming or attack on police every day.

"It's frightening really, when you think about it, that somebody comes to work and they go home with a broken leg because they've been rammed by a criminal," he said.

Domestic violence

An increase in domestic violence offences was also reported in the statistics, partly represented by an 8.1 per cent rise in the number of alleged breaches of court orders.

Deputy Commissioner Patton said more than 80 per cent of those order breaches related to intervention orders, demonstrating an increased police commitment to enforcing the law.

"We're holding them to account. We're detecting them, we're apprehending them and we're taking them before the courts," Deputy Commissioner Patton said.

He also said the number of family violence offences had risen, which he in part attributed to the increased police resources being dedicated to investigating domestic violence.

The number of arrests and charges laid over breaches of bail conditions was also a reason behind the increase, he said.

Firearm offences

The deputy commissioner said police were basically seizing firearms "on a daily basis", which is reflected in the statistics with an increase in the rate of weapons and explosives offences of 5.6 per cent.

Despite the increase, Deputy Commissioner Patton said it was still rare for firearms to be used to injure members of the public.

He said many firearm offences consisted of criminals being shot by rival criminals or associates and then refusing to help police with investigations into the shootings.

"It's very rare that we're seeing random use of firearms against a member of the public, generally it's within the criminal community," he said.

The Love Machine nightclub drive-by shooting was one of the most high-profile public shootings in the past year.

Patron Richard Arow and security guard Aaron Khalid Osmani were killed in the Love Machine shooting in April. ( Supplied: Facebook/GoFundMe )

Richard Arow was waiting to enter the venue as a patron when he was fatally injured by a spray of bullets and security guard Khalid Osmani was shot dead.

Police have charged two young men over the shooting.

'Swarming' and shop theft

Police also cited a 7.6 per cent increase in shop theft as another key reason behind the increased number of offences.

Deputy Commissioner Patton said police were aware of the growing shop theft trend known as "swarming".

"Loosely it's been termed swarming and we fully understand that, where we see youth go in and steal things en masse," he said.

"We recognise it's a significant issue, it's a significant issue to retailers, it's a significant issue for confidence of community and how we're going about our business … that they can be free and safe when they're wandering around shopping centres."

Numberplate theft, which is up 2.8 per cent, was also singled out by police but the deputy commissioner said he was still not entirely sure where the 20,000-odd numberplates stolen during the past year had ended up.

"I don't know where the numberplate cave is that they're all going to because we're not locating as many of them as we'd like," he said.