Victoria the stolen car capital of Australia

Victoria is the stolen car capital of Australia.

The state has taken the unenviable title away from New South Wales.

A whopping 14, 381 cars were stolen across Victoria in the year to October – a 5.6 per cent increase on the previous year.

It put Victoria ahead of NSW for the first time since the national motor vehicle theft reduction council began collecting the data.

The Herald Sun revealed the Holden Commodore as the car of choice for crooks, with criminal gangs and bored youths to blame for the rise.

Melbourne’s northern suburbs are home to the highest number of victims, while Greater Dandenong posted a 24 per cent increase in car thefts for the year.

Assistant Police Commissioner Bob Hill said the statistics hadn’t caught police by surprise.

‘We’ve been seeing a worrying trend for a while now,’ he told Neil Mitchell.

‘We have approximately 46 cars stolen across Victoria a day.’

Click PLAY below to hear Victoria Police’s plan to combat the problem.