Penitentiary issues The number of complaints about the penitentiary system was very similar to the figures of 2015, with a growth of ten units. In qualitative terms, the issues relating to overcrowding, particularly in lodgment and food, and also concerning the use of disciplinary powers and violence situations were more frequent. Reversely, there was in decline concerning transfer requests. The access to healthcare was also a significant issue during this year, promoting contacts also with the relevant units of the National Health Service. As the Ombudsman’s concerns are not restricted to the universe of the persons within walls, it is worth mentioning the assessment made of the visitor’s conditions in Caxias Prison, namely in what concerned the conditions during the waiting period, prior to the visit, and the enforcement of legal rules concerning priority of elderly persons, persons with disabilities, persons with children and pregnant women. Suitable preventive measures were reinforced.(56) Besides the visits made on prisons in the scope of the National Preventive Mechanism,(57) and, all year round, of the visits personally made by the Ombudsman to those prisons chosen in the framework of the project The Ombudsman, the prisons and the 21st century: journal of some visits(58), 15 visits were held to prisons, to observe their conditions or to meet with persons detained, namely the prisons of Lisboa (3 times), of Tires, of Vale de Judeus (3 times), of Coimbra, of Monsanto (2 times), of Alcoentre (2 times), of Évora, of Aveiro and the one functioning near the Judiciary Police in Lisboa. Other issues The complaints relating to access to administrative files have doubled, in a trend also felt in complaints concerning data protection. Likewise, the presentation of complaints against the conduct of social media was more frequent, promoting the referral to the appropriate regulatory authority (ERC). An issue particularly frequent was the demand, by public authorities, namely, to citizens seeking some action by them, of a photocopy of their citizen’s ID card, openly disobeying to the legal rules. One of these complaints was presented against ERC, as this entity required the presentation of a photocopy of digitalization of the citizen’s card to (56)  Complaint Q-4078/16. (57)  Described in an annex to this report. (58)  See 3.2. 66 |