FACT: Domestic violence affects in one every four women in the UK.
FACT: In one week, two women will die because of this horrific crime.
FACT: The police receive one domestic violence related call every minute.
FACT: There are more animal sanctuaries in Britain than refuges for women fleeing domestic violence.

As I began researching this article, the strangest thing happened. Initially, I wanted to highlight the case of domestic violence on the back of this month's big British film release, Provoked - the disturbing true life story of Kiranjit Ahluwalia who was imprisoned after killing her violently abusive husband. The film details Kiranjit's plight as a physically, mentally and sexually abused wife of 10 years and how her landmark retrial changed British laws on provocation in the cases of severely battered women.

Also, the Home Office marked March as Domestic Violence Awareness month by injecting funding of almost £2m in to various anti-domestic violence initiatives across the country. This included specialist domestic violence courts with dedicated police and prosecutors and support for criminal justice agencies and ongoing work with voluntary organisations such as Women's Aid and Refuge. Really, I wanted to applaud how DV was finally getting tackled in the same way other high volume/victim crimes were, and how awareness raising efforts meant it could no longer be seen as a crime against a small minority of women.

But then I discovered the disturbing truth. Men's violence against women is at an all time high.

Despite the Crown Prosecution Services (CPS) revealing that by December 2006 successful prosecutions of perpetrators had risen by 65 per cent, and government-backed initiatives and legislation giving police officers and the CPS authority to press charges and prosecute an abuser when a woman is too frightened to take matters in to her own hands becoming more commonplace, the numbers of women being killed and abused aren't going down. A third of female murder victims - around 110 a year - are killed by exes or current partners. For me, it is one woman too many. There's a pressing need to figure out how we can eradicate such a shocking crime.

Just on Sunday I got a call from a friend who had been beaten up by her partner. A repeat incident, it has again left her emotions and self-esteem in tatters. I realised, with heart-breaking pain, how close to home domestic violence can hit anyone of us. And it angers me. It angers me, because the place where we are supposed to feel safe and secure – our home – is the very place in which many of us are now living in fear and with the threat of violence.

Somewhere the message of wife-beating as completely unacceptable, has been lost. The statistics indicate a consensus that a woman being punched or smacked by her partner is a less serious crime than her being attacked at work or in the street. This isn't a cheap shot at man-bashing. According to police, men who'll admit to having attacked a partner are rare. And those who've been convicted represent only a small percentage of men who continue to abuse. It unacceptably doesn't add up.

There should be no question of abusers being arrested and prosecuted for DV - it is a crime against the state. Part of our shared battle now is to ensure DV cases get to court in the first place so violent men can comprehend the consequences of their actions. When victims are reluctant to prosecute one of the many reasons is the fear of not receiving adequate support from society and the criminal justice system. There is also a British history of judges giving out soft and unforgivably lenient sentences to men convicted of domestic violence to take in to account. The responsibility of preventing DV, the chronic under-reporting and taking of legal action can't then, lie just with the victims.

My friend was confused her going to the police could ruin her career, her family, her partner's career, even her chances of meeting another man. She also agonised about being branded a liar because everyone else knew him as such 'a nice guy'. These are the challenges which surround domestic violence.

My friend asked what she could do to stop her man from beating her, but studies in to DV repeatedly show there's nothing a woman can ever do to reduce her partner's violence. Right now, I believe it's imprisonment. Jail can be a strong deterrent as not enough research has been done in to proving whether or not perpetrators who attend rehabilitation programmes stop offending. And by giving violent men therapy, there's also a colossal danger of assuming they are 'sick' and in need of our help when it's the victim we should be supporting.

Regardless of how much any victim of DV can tell you about the horrific effects of mental and physical abuse, only 24 per cent of survivors ever seek help. It's as complex a crime as it gets. DV is the crime least likely to be reported to the police – an inconceivable truth when you discover the estimated total cost of domestic violence to society in monetary terms is £23 billion per annum in the UK.

Another constant battle when preventing domestic violence is lack of sensitivity and myths around battered women. Why don't they leave, people ask? Women don't leave for a myriad of reasons. First, there's the emotional attachment to her partner. Add to that the impact she may believe leaving will have on her family, re-housing, and financial implications and we can perhaps try and see how fragile the line between staying and tolerating and leaving can be for some women. What's worse is when women believe silence is their only form of protection against the partners who systematically abuse them and a public attitude which makes them ashamed of what is happening to them.

The harsh and sickening truth is that society tolerates DV. I know a man (an educated, professional, property developer by the way - just to highlight how violent men come from all backgrounds) whose own mother explained his continued violence towards his fiancée as a symptom of stress. 'He works so hard,' she would say. This man's behaviour included throwing lit cigarettes at his fiancée's face, spitting on her and kicking her before abandoning her in an empty house for five days to 'teach her a lesson for her big mouth'. Here, 'stress' and she herself were used as excuses for his venomous anger. Abuse with an excuse is a major characteristic of violent men. Yet these excuses are never the cause of violence. DV has nothing to do with a man being an alcoholic, a criminal, a drug addict, financially-burdened, stressed out or unemployed. But it has everything to do with a man who feels he has the right to overpower a woman by way of violence.

We've yet to work out what kind of voice is needed in order to eradicate this terrible crime. Locking men up is an important part of the solution but we also need to ensure we're not simply locking the problem away without proper attention. The way to alter staggering statistics is to respond to DV by making abusers culpable for their crimes, and perhaps reaching out to boys and girls at schools with lessons in how serious an issue DV is. It is against the law in the same way drink driving is. And just like how the act of drink driving has become socially reprehensible, we need to reinforce zero-tolerance when it comes to battering women. Domestic violence has no place in a relationship or society. If we continue to raise awareness and stop the ongoing blinkered-eyed acceptance surrounding it, perhaps only then can the rhetoric on protection of women against this terrible crime match the reality.

Spotting the signs of an abusive relationship:
Does your partner:
Lose his temper erratically over trivial issues?
Call you names during arguments?
Threaten or intimidate you?
Scare you by hitting walls, lashing out and throwing things?
Constantly put you down?
Blame you for how he feels or acts?

Where to get help:
The Freephone 24 Hour National Helpline (run in partnership between Women's Aid and Refuge) is 0808 2000 247. Visit Refuge at www.refuge.org.uk