Carrie's ex-husband is about to be released from prison. He is serving a two-year sentence after his violent outbursts and campaign of abusive control left her isolated and terrified.

After completing just seven months of his punishment, this man will now walk free within a few weeks, under Labour's early release scheme. And Carrie fears for her life.

We met earlier this year at a conference on domestic abuse, where she spoke confidently and with great passion about the need to change how councils and emergency services regard violence in the home.

'I was a prisoner in my own house,' she told me. 'I couldn't see my friends. I wasn't allowed to have my own money. He forced me to break off contact with my mother.'

Throughout the abuse, her repeated appeals to social workers went mostly unheeded, as did her reports to police. It was only when two constables answered her 999 call that she was finally believed – because her partner attacked one of the officers. It was that, and not his repeated assaults on her, which saw him jailed.

When I talked to her on the phone this weekend, she was distraught, but also under the influence of tranquillisers prescribed by her GP.

'I'm on diazepam,' she explained. 'Otherwise I'm just panicking all the time. My ex is going to come after me and the children, I know he is. He's told me he will.'

But she had just begun to rebuild her relationship with her parents – and knows that if she tries to forge a new identity, her ex-husband will target her parents too.

Her story is far from uncommon. In case after case, men pursue women who have done everything possible to hide. They go after their mothers, sisters or female friends, bombarding them with threats and intimidation tactics.

And it is not only Carrie's former partner who will pose a violent risk to her from the moment he is released, after serving a mere third of his time in prison, thanks to Andy Burnham's latest sentencing act.

In yet another U-turn on the early release scheme, the Prime Minister has said anyone convicted of unlawful killing will not be included, but inmates serving indefinite terms for public protection sentences (IPPs) could be released for extra cell spaces – the vast majority of whom were handed an IPP for violent or sexual offences.

And offenders such as domestic abusers and stalkers will also still be let out early.

Such men should never be included in any early release scheme. We need to have, as in cases of murder, rape, child grooming and now manslaughter, a blanket ban on letting them out before their sentences have been fully served.

Those who commit ongoing sexual and domestic violence, and crimes rooted in coercive control, are deeply dangerous. They will offend repeatedly. The courts understand this is true in other categories of serious crime, such as child sexual abuse, yet it is not properly recognised when it comes to violence against women.

This is in spite of the chilling fact that many men brag about their intention to seek revenge against the women they blame for their imprisonment.

Labour says it is not possible to keep men like this in prison, because spaces are so limited.

The long-term answers to that should be obvious. We need more prison capacity, but we also need to treat domestic abuse as the serious crime that it clearly is.

The current policy sends a terrible message to all abusers. They know they are very unlikely to be prosecuted for their repeated rapes and assaults against partners and other victims under their control.

And in the infrequent cases where prison sentences are imposed, their jail time will be curtailed, thanks to Labour's early release madness.

The very fact that so few abusive men are jailed should tell us something about the few who do go to prison: They will be the worst of the worst, and it cannot be safe to let them out after a few weeks or months.

A short sentence does not deter men like that. It serves only to make them angrier and more vengeful.

An immediate solution is needed, and there is a simple one. Most women in prison have not committed violent offences. They are in jail because of drug and alcohol addiction, leading to repeated theft, burglary, fraud and other comparatively petty offences.

Of course, there are well-known exceptions. But female murderers and sex attackers are few.

A large proportion of women in prison are there as an indirect result of sustained male violence. It's appalling but true that women are more likely to be jailed, in the long-term aftermath of rape, than their rapist is.

The emotional trauma cause by sexual assault is a common trigger for alcohol and drug abuse – and this inevitably leads to crime in many cases.

These women need treatment, not punishment. That would benefit everyone, including the taxpayer, because programmes that help women overcome addiction are invariably cheaper than prison.

Overcrowding in prisons is a massive problem for Labour. But allowing dangerous men the freedom to stalk, torment and attack their ex-partners is the worst possible response.