ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an overview of official statistics, based on police figures and the government's self-report study. It explores that 'domestic violence' is not a standalone criminal offence, as explained in the introduction, some of the criminal offences that relate to physical violence against women are then listed. The chapter provides a lot of space to responses to partner violence, though these are equally applicable to physical and non-physical forms of partner violence so also refer to some of the chapters that follow particularly on psychological abuse. It describes the domestic violence perpetrator programmes, domestic violence protection orders and the domestic violence disclosure scheme. The domestic violence perpetrator programme is a group work programme for men who want to stop using violence and abuse within intimate partner relationships. They developed in the UK and marked a departure from previous domestic violence activism. The chapter explores the difficulties involved in discovering how much physical violence exists.
