The police encourage people to report domestic violence

Six new public protection units have recently been set up, each headed by a detective inspector.

Many of the officers and staff are experienced at working in domestic violence and child protection.

Det Sup Mike Jones said that it showed that vulnerable victims were one of the force's highest priorities.

He said: "It's too early to say just what the impact on reoffending will be but I do expect the number of repeat offences to drop in the long term because of the strategies and risk assessments we're putting in place.

"We always encourage people to report domestic violence.

"We make it absolutely clear to offenders that violence is not acceptable and that committing offences behind closed doors will not prevent us from making every effort to bring them to justice."