Action Breaks Silence is an educational charity established to create a world where women and girls can live their lives free from fear of gender-based violence.

Action Breaks Silence offers a 12-hour community intervention to stop gender-based violence by upskilling young unemployed people to deliver the Empowerment through Self-Defence Programme for women and girls, the Hero Empathy Programme for boys and educational workshops for teachers and caregivers.

• Approximately 85,000 women are raped and over 400,000 women are sexually assaulted in England and Wales every year.

• Sexual violence is even more prevalent for younger women as one in three teenage girls has experienced some form of sexual violence from a partner before they are 18.

• Half of all young people (irrespective of gender) reported emotional abuse, most often being shouted at or being called names.  

• One fifth of young people are exposed to physical violence (a greater proportion are female) and experience as much abuse in relationships as adults.

• On average, two women in England and Wales are killed every week by a current or former male partner.

• The UK police receive a call every minute about domestic abuse, 89% of which are about a woman being abused by a man.