A staggering 80,000 women – roughly one every 6.5 minutes – are raped every year in the UK, says the Home Office. As the Government launches a new consultation on sexual violence, Susie Weldon asks why conviction rates are so low

Here's the good news – more women are coming forward to report rape than ever before.

Here's the very bad news – rape conviction rates are still abysmally low and have actually fallen in 18 out of 24 police forces to an average of 6.1 per cent in England and Wales, according to the Fawcett Soci ety.

Avon and Somerset is one of the worst, falling to just 4.2 per cent in 2006 (the latest figures available), according to the Fawcett Society – far below the best performing force in the West, Wiltshire, which has a conviction rate of 8.3 per cent and Gloucestershire at 7.4 per cent.

Not only this, but services for rape victims are so patchy that Fawcett has described the situation as virtually "a licence to rape".

The society is angry – and so are Bristol women. So much so that they recently held a Reclaim The Night march, organised by the Bristol Feminist Network, to emphasise everyone's right to use public spaces in the day and after dark without fear of being harassed or assaulted.

It was partly prompted by the recent assaults in Clifton, Bristol, but as campaigner Katy Ladbrook points out, the problem is far wider than that.

"Violence against women is happening everywhere all the time and in ways that are not only physical but much more subtle and pervasive," she says.

"The standard response to the problem, which asks women to stay inside when night falls, simply isn't good enough."

Nearly 14,500 people reported a sexual assault to the police in 2006, according to the Fawcett Society – 61 per cent more than the 9,008 reported five years earlier. But this is a tiny fraction of the real figures, say campaigners.

Indeed, research indicates that between 75 and 95 per cent of rapes are never reported to the police, and 40 per cent of victims never even tell a friend what has happened to them.

That's why the Home Office estimates that at least 80,000 women (one study suggests it could be as high as 100,000) are raped every year in the UK.

The Government has been worried about the low rape conviction rate for some time.

In 2007, it published a Sexual Violence and Abuse Action Plan which said: "Sexual violence and childhood sexual abuse are two of the most serious and damaging crimes in our society."

There's no adequate figure that can be put on the long-lasting trauma of rape, but there is a financial cost to the country, which the Government has assessed at a staggering £8.5 billion. This is mainly due to long-term health issues from unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and panic attacks.

Worse still, some women are so devastated by their experience that they attempt suicide.

Despite this depressing state of affairs, there is some good news on the horizon. A network of sexual assault referral centres (Sarcs) has recently opened in the West.

Sarcs – a major plank in the Government's strategy for dealing with rape – are safe, one-stop locations where victims can access quick and sympathetic medical care, counselling, advice and support as well as police services under one roof. Bristol's first Sarc, The Bridge, opened in February and Gloucester's Hope House opened in October last year. The New Swindon Sanctuary in Swindon has been running for nearly three years, and new Sarcs are planned for Cornwall and Dorset.

The hope is that these Sarcs, with their more victim-centred approach, will transform women's experience of surviving rape, although some police officers fear they may not necessarily improve conviction rates because there's no impetus on victims to turn to the police.

Providing even more and much-needed support for Bristol victims will be the new Rape Crisis Centre which opens later this year.

That's not all. This week, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith announced the largest-ever cross-Government public consultation to tackle violence against women and girls.

It will begin with a conference in Ashton Gate, Bristol, on April 23 where representatives from the voluntary sector and statutory agencies as well as survivors of violence will come together to discuss the problem.

A Help Us To Keep Women Safe roadshow bus will tour the South West from April 23 to 25 visiting venues in Bristol, Swindon, Devon and Dorset so people can give their views.

Some critics have voiced concerns that the consultation could just amount to a talking exercise. At Monday's launch of the campaign, Sandra Holey, chief executive of domestic violence charity Refuge, made a high-profile attack on the Home Secretary's initiative, saying: "We've had enough talking – we need action."

Gloucestershire shows what can be achieved when a police force does take action and concentrates on securing rape convictions. It had no convictions at all in 2004, but after it was sharply criticised in the Fawcett Society report that year the force overhauled its strategy on sexual violence, according to Detective Superintendent Jeff Brooks.

By concentrating on collecting better evidence early on and supporting victims effectively through the criminal justice process, its conviction rates shot up from 0.89 per cent to 7.4 per cent in just two years.

difficulty with obtaining rape convictions is that far from the stereotype of the "stranger rapist", most people have some acquaintance with their attacker, however slight.

"Victims are not being dragged off into the bushes by a masked man," he says.

"The profile of our reported rapes is that in 85 per cent of cases the victim and the attacker know each other. It might be just for a few hours, it might be longer.

"The legal issue that comes up time and time again is over consent and gaining corroborative evidence.

"To a degree, it's also about changing attitudes in society – the 'she asked for it' attitude."

■ The Bridge Sarc, Bristol – 0117 342 6999

■ Hope House Sarc, Gloucester – 01452 754 390

■ The New Swindon Sanctuary Sarc – 0808 168 0024.

■ Survivors Swindon is a support group for male rape survivors – 0845 430 9371