A Senate inquiry is needed to understand the extent of violence against Indigenous women "right across Australia", Labor MP and shadow minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney has said.

Key points: Advocates want a national taskforce to deal with the rate of missing and murdered Indigenous women in Australia

Advocates want a national taskforce to deal with the rate of missing and murdered Indigenous women in Australia Labor MP and shadow minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney said the scale of the problem needed to be understood before launching a taskforce

Labor MP and shadow minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney said the scale of the problem needed to be understood before launching a taskforce She is calling for a Senate inquiry into the issue, saying there is currently a "lack of urgency" around dealing with the violence

She is calling for a Senate inquiry into the issue, saying there is currently a "lack of urgency" around dealing with the violence The calls come after the ABC revealed the over-representation of Indigenous women in missing persons statistics

Ms Burney said the rate of Aboriginal women going missing or being murdered in Australia warranted "greater attention and consideration".

"There is certainly a lack of urgency, a lack of recognition of the broader issue of violence in Australia and the amount of women who lose their lives," she said.

"People need to recognise that for Aboriginal families, these are not statistics, they are real people. They're sisters, mothers, cousins, aunties."

The shadow cabinet minister said the true impact of the violence was far from being understood.

"It's not just people murdered or people missing, but it's the injury as well that goes unnoticed," Ms Burney said.

"The thing that I am very incensed about, it's not just the murders, but the actual hospitalisations, permanent disabilities, and the maiming that takes place."

Nationally, Indigenous women make up 16 per cent of all female murder victims, despite comprising less than 3 per cent of the population.

The ABC obtained exclusive data revealing, in some states, Aboriginal women also made up 10 per cent of unsolved missing persons cases. These women were often presumed dead.

Advocates have called on the Federal Government to assemble a national taskforce to address the problem, as Canada and the United States have done.

Ms Burney cautioned against Australia launching a national taskforce before fully understanding the issue, but she did suggest an inquiry.

"It seems to me that a taskforce is an easy option to go to," she said.

"We need to understand the problem better before going to a taskforce. A much better option would be for a Senate inquiry."

'They just disappeared off the face of the Earth'

Human rights advocates in Australia said they had watched as Canada and the United States moved to tackle the scourge of violence and murder destroying the lives of Indigenous people and it was time for Australia to follow suit.

The Federal Government must investigate the crisis that has been "neglected" for too long, human rights lawyer Hannah McGlade said.

"We have so many Aboriginal children who are being deprived of their mothers who are victims of homicide, who are victims of rape, who carry that damage with them through life," she said.

"It does damage not just to the individual, but all of society.

"It also says we are not a country that respects our Indigenous women and children."

Widjabul woman Rhoda Roberts has worked as a journalist, broadcaster, director and festival programmer in the arts and says two women in her family have just "disappeared".

Lois Roberts went missing in 1998. ( Supplied: Rhonda Roberts )

Her twin sister, Lois Roberts, was 39 years old when she disappeared off the main road in Nimbin trying to hitchhike to Lismore, in northern New South Wales, in the winter of 1998.

Lois had been in a car accident at just 20 years old, which left her with an acquired brain injury and very vulnerable.

"'We were absolutely beside ourselves wondering what had happened. She was very habitual in her behaviour, when her groceries weren't picked up and things like that — we knew something had happened."

A desperate search by her family and friends ended in tragedy.

Lois's badly mutilated body was found six months later in remote bushland in the Whian Whian State Forest, north of Lismore.

"It was brutal and horrible to know that, but at the same time we knew what happened," Ms Roberts said.

Her killer has never been found.

Rhoda Roberts has had two female family members go missing. ( ABC Arts: Anna Kucera )

Ms Roberts said more needed to be done in Australia to address an "epidemic" of violence targeting Indigenous women and girls.

"It's bigger than domestic violence. There is violence against Aboriginal women every day, in every sector of Australia," she said.

"It's a black mark [on Australia] and those are just the ones we know about. Our community is often in very vulnerable in their lifestyle ... and they just literally disappear off the face off the Earth."

Lois's murder isn't the only tragedy that has befallen the family.

In 2002, Ms Roberts's cousin, Lucy McDonald, vanished from her Lismore home.

The mother of two children has never been found and the family continues to wait for answers.

"There is an absolute silence and no compassion, and that's what's most hurtful," Ms Roberts said.

"When two Aboriginal women have disappeared in a very short length of time, you'd think they'd be more discussion, more investigation.

"If it were two white women, I truly wonder if it would have been a different type of undertaking with a taskforce."

MeToo did not help Indigenous women: lawyer

Ms McGlade said despite an international push to end violence against women in the #MeToo era, the rights and safety of Aboriginal women had been ignored.

"What an Aboriginal woman faces is not just sexism without racism, it is a combination and very often vulnerability, poverty and disability is all going to be in the mix, so it's a completely different experience," she said.

"Aboriginal women are still experiencing racial stereotyping, which can negatively affect their experience of justice.

"Justice [can come] too little too late, and doesn't come at all for most Aboriginal women."

Human rights lawyer and academic Dr Hannah McGlade. ( ABC News: Jack Fisher )

Ms McGlade said Australia was not a country as committed to human rights "as we say we are", and called on all state governments and the Commonwealth to formalise their approach to the problem.

The Minister for Indigenous Australians and state-based counterparts needed to act and create a national taskforce to properly assess the scale of the problem, she said.

"They really need to take a serious look at this issue, because it is a severe human rights issue that is affecting our community at a very serious level," Ms McGlade said.

Minister for Indigenous Australians Ken Wyatt said the disproportionate rate of Indigenous women in long-term unsolved missing cases was unacceptable.

"Any woman who is missing or murdered is totally unacceptable, and all governments need to work to tackle this collectively," he said in a statement.

Mr Wyatt said reducing the rate of violence against women was a "national priority for all Australian governments".

Ms Burney said she was not surprised to find Aboriginal women were at greater risk than non-Indigenous women.

"On all the social indicators, be it housing, health, educational outcomes, the statistics for Aboriginal people are worse," she said.