Court of Auditors: on the Prison Plan delays and inattention

A seriously critical situation, often with the connotations of an emergency. Even the Court of Auditors, from its particular point of view, underlines the dramatic nature of theconditions of prisons. Ten years after the conclusion of the commissarial management, the analysis on the state of implementation of the 'Prisons Plan' underlines its delays and highlights critical points of prison overcrowding especially in Lombardy, Apulia, Campania, Lazio, Veneto and Sicily. All this in the 284-page report entitled 'Infrastructure and digitisation: Prison Plan'.

Alongside the need for the creation ofnew places in penal institutions, the lack of numerous interventions and the urgent need to complete the extraordinary maintenance works already started, in order to improve the environmental, hygienic and sanitary conditions and treatment inside the institutions, emerge.

First of all, there emerged a widespread and generalised dilatation of thetimes for the implementation of the interventions which, even where the works were concluded, recorded a systematic disregard of the relevant procedural and financial timetables, even with reference only to the phase of technical-administrative testing. Among other things, this has led to a frequent mismatch between the speed of implementation of the intervention and the speed of change of the detention needs of the Institute concerned.

This is attested by the recurrent change, widely spread throughout the speeches, of the framework of needs represented by the Department of Penitentiary Administration when planning was already in progress if not in its final stage. A change that, if due to delays in communication between theprison directorates and the Dap, warns the Court of Auditors, could not be remedied even by the recent establishment of the Commissioner for Prisons.On the contrary, in the opinion of the Court of Auditors, the recently introduced applications to monitor the prison overcrowding mentioned in the last Report of the Minister on the administration of justice could be useful, so that, first of all, the rapid conclusion of those interventions, in many cases programmed before 2014, which, in the most critical territorial contexts, are still waiting to be concluded, could be ensured.

Another problematic element is constituted, the Report points out, by recurrent instances of contractual non-compliance, often due to economic difficulties, on the part of the winning companies and the consequent termination of contracts. And so, the Court advises, greater care in defining the general and special requirements for participation in tenders for this sector, or the introduction of appropriate guarantees in the stipulation of contracts could help to reduce the phenomenon.